


mountain at my gates

by KyloTrashForever



Series: ABOhHoHo [10]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alpha Ben Solo, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alpha/Omega, Engineer Rey, F/M, Flannel Kink, Forced Cohabitation, Fuckable Redwood, Knotting, Lumberjack Ben Solo, Lumberjackoff, Mating Cycles/In Heat, Oh No I Missed My Suppressants, Omega Rey, Scenting, Sharing Body Heat, Sharing a Bed, Snowed In, THERE WAS ONLY ONE BED, explicit hand holding, tropes galore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-14
Updated: 2020-03-30
Packaged: 2021-02-28 23:42:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 26,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23135599
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KyloTrashForever/pseuds/KyloTrashForever
Summary: “I can probably pull your car out of the ditch when the snow stops,” he offers, her hopes soaring with promise for the briefest of moments before they come plummeting down when he adds: “But you aren’t getting through either way for a few days. There’s at least seven inches over the roads right now.”Her mouth parts in quiet dismay. “What does that—what does that mean?”“I guess…” He gives her what she thinks is a sympathetic look, but it’s hard to tell, with the gruff air he clings to. “Guess that means you're stuck here. For a little while.”She thinks she’s gaping now, eyes moving around this tiny room, this miniscule space that hardly allows for privacy or space, and for the love of god—there is only one bed. What the fuck is she supposed to do here?“Stay here?” She swallows. “With you?”He jerks his head to a door behind him. “Bathroom’s that way.”In which despite being snowed in, things are about to get very heated for Rey and Ben.
Relationships: Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Series: ABOhHoHo [10]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1539175
Comments: 1387
Kudos: 3435





	1. drive my car without the brakes

**Author's Note:**

> HELLO. If you missed it, in honor of my two year fic anniversary in April, and my impending 100th work, I had a MASSIVE choose your own adventure experience going on twitter Wednesday, which included several polls to build a prompt just for YOU GUYS! 
> 
> This prompt is the RUNNER UP of that event, and therefore I will be focusing on it for the remainder of March and leaving the WINNER for April!
> 
> Runner-Up Prompt:  
> Hard Outside/Soft Inside Lumberjack Alpha Ben Solo and Horny Engineer Omega Rey Johnson featuring Explicit Hand Holding, ABO, and Mutual Masturbation. (Ft. Snowed In and Bed Sharing for funnies.)
> 
> Title from this [song](https://youtu.be/l_EIE5f2t6M) of the same title, because it feels like a double entendre when you imagine Ben as the mountain and Rey as the... you get the idea.
> 
> THIS WILL BE HORNY TROPY GARBAGE I HOPE YOU ENJOY.  
> 

This isn’t how she thought this day would go.

Rey stares out at the snow awash in the glow of her headlights, exhausted from trying to turn the steering wheel this way and that to no avail. Her tires spin uselessly in the ground beneath it, kicking up a spray behind the car that she can see in her rearview. She takes a lot longer than necessary, sitting in the driver’s seat with her hands wrapped tightly around the wheel—cursing her luck. 

She’s thinking about Poe’s warning to put chains on her tires. She’s thinking about Armitage begging her to postpone the development meeting. She’s thinking about the weather channel reports calling for a heavier snowfall through the mountains.

She just wishes she’d been thinking about these things more _before_ she left. 

She drops her forehead against the steering wheel with a sharp _thunk_ and mutters a soft _ow_ before she lets out a sigh. She is miles away from the city in either direction, and the ditch she’s slid into has resulted in the entire bottom half of her car being buried in snow. 

She lets out a deep sigh as she turns her face to rest it against the steering wheel, jolting up quickly when she accidentally sounds the horn for a prolonged moment. She looks out into the snow with a worried heart, having no idea what to do.

She remembers passing houses a few miles back, but thinks there is almost no way she will make it that far in the snow. Still, she can’t seem to think of any alternative, her cell phone showing not even a _single_ bar of reception in these godforsaken mountains. 

She lets out a disgruntled sound as she reaches over to the passenger seat for her purse and her coat, shrugging into the heavy number and cursing under her breath. 

It looks like she’s going for a walk.

* * *

She regrets her decision only a half hour in. 

She’s grateful that she went for her riding boots this morning, at the very least. Even with her thicker socks, her toes feel nearly frozen, and the snow has gone from a steady drift to a flurry, leaving her shivering in her thick coat as she trudges down the side of the road. 

Her teeth have begun to chatter so hard that her jaw actually hurts, and she is beginning to think this was _beyond_ a terrible idea. She could have sworn that she’d seen a house a mile back—or was it two? It’s hard to concentrate with the cold seeping into her bones, leaving her muscles heavy and her steps slow. 

She’s starting to get actually worried, wondering if she should turn back, but just as she begins to wrestle with the decision, something promising catches her eye.

It’s just a dark spot amidst a world of white—just the shape of it, but solid and clear—and she urges her muscles into action even as they burn with effort against the chill. She’s out of breath by the time she reaches what turns out to be an old mailbox made of rusted metal—a hand-painted sign hanging underneath that reads _private property._

She turns her head against the icy wind to peer down what seems to be a snow-covered path—squinting against the flurry as it winds through the trees. As she turns her head upwards she notices a stark plume of smoke rising against the grey sky, and she expels a frozen sigh of relief from her chilled lungs. 

_People._

She takes off down the path in as much of a hurry as she can manage, her toes effectively numb at this point and a worrisome sensation around her ankles and up over her legs that warns her clothes have gotten somewhat wet and then frozen again, and she pushes herself onward with more energy than she really has left. 

She can’t say how long it takes her to stumble into a clearing—snow up to her calves and her coat starting to bleed through with snow. There’s a little cabin nestled in the trees that stands out like a stain in the snow, the windows lit up with warmth and shining like an actual ray of sunshine. A slightly smaller structure that seems to be some sort of shed rests off to her left, but she passes it by as she barrels on towards the front porch. 

There is immediate relief in pulling her feet from the snow and climbing the steps—even if her steps are too heavy and her limbs feel like they’re frozen through. She knocks frantically against the large wooden door with shaking hands, her jaw aching with the way her teeth chatter as she staggers over to the window to try and peer past the curtains. 

There’s a fire going that she can make out through the thin sliver of fabric that makes her jealous in a way she hadn’t thought possible, but she doesn’t notice any movement. Doesn’t see anyone moving about. She returns to the door to try and knock again, even giving the handle a panicked test out of desperation. 

She makes a frustrated sound that is lost to the wind as she kicks the door lightly in irritation, crossing her arms tighter across her chest. She thinks maybe they’ve just gone somewhere, thinks maybe they’ll come back soon—and she sees no other alternative but waiting on the porch for someone to return. 

She’s turning with every intention of huddling next to the door, praying that someone returns soon—but a towering dark shape looms in her peripheral that makes her spin a little faster than she means to. She lets out a shriek as some massive _something_ lumbers across the snow, hollering over the wind and approaching fast in a way that’s almost menacing. She turns to bound back down the steps, having every intention of putting distance between herself and this snowy mountain monster before they wrestle a gun out of their snow gear and pepper her ass for trespassing. 

Her foot catches on a too-wide crack of the wooden planks that make up the porch, and she experiences what happens next as if in slow motion. 

The wind whips by her faster as she starts to fall, the shout that tries to escape her comes out choked, and she watches the world of white pass by in a dizzied rush as she falls and falls and _falls—_

And then everything goes black.

* * *

The first thing she notices when she slips back into consciousness is the warmth. 

Burning, blessed _warmth_.

She feels it deep down into her skin and her blood and her _bones_ and she thinks to herself that she will _never_ take it for granted ever again. Her toes curl, and she’s grateful that she still has the ability to move them, stretching a little under heavy blankets as she categorizes limbs that seem to have not succumbed to frostbite.

But there’s something else. Something _beneath_ that simmering warmth that assaults her in a very new, very _different_ way.

_Alpha._

She hasn’t even opened her eyes, but she breathes in a deep lungful in a way that isn’t choice, it’s _compulsion._ She feels it seeping down inside to a place even deeper than the heat; a place that makes her throat constrict with some fire she’s never felt and her thighs press together with urgency. 

Her eyes fly open as she takes in the innards of a seemingly one-roomed, wood-walled structure—a crackling fire in the corner of a living area that resides across from the giant four-poster she seems to be draped over. There is a kitchen on the other side, one that is small but functional, but it is none of these things that really capture her attention.

It’s the long legs that spill over the edge of a worn armchair. 

It’s the wide palms that shift and move to work a knife over a whittled piece of wood.

It’s the stretched flannel that looks like it’s in danger of ripping across barrel chest and broad shoulders.

It’s the very large, very _Alpha_ man that’s looking at her with mild interest as she comes to.

Rey thinks she knows now who the snowy mountain monster is that sent her tumbling.

She gapes for a moment as she tries to reconcile his presence here, tries to reconcile _her_ presence here—eyes darting around the room as she scrambles up the bed in a panic.

“Easy now,” he murmurs.

 _His voice._

It sends an inexorable tremor through her limbs that leaves her unsettled.

But that isn’t the only thing that leaves her unsettled.

“Who are you?”

“Name’s Ben,” he tells her gruffly, his words slow and careful as if his mouth has a hard time letting go of them. “Ben Solo.”

She lets her gaze move over his features, over a strong nose and heavy brow and full mouth surrounded by a heavy amount of scruff, but it’s his eyes that are the most striking. Deep, _dark—_ thoughtful in a way that makes it hard to look away from them. If she’s being honest, _all_ of him is a little hard to look away from.

She shakes away those thoughts, trying to focus on her predicament.

“Okay, _Ben Solo,_ ” she huffs. “What the hell am I doing here? What am I—” She realizes then, the biggest piece of the puzzle that is her unease. Her hand slides under the thick quilt she’s tucked into, letting the other come to her chest to meet soft flannel clasped with wooden buttons just as her finger skirts down her very _bare_ thigh. She feels heat climbing up her neck, trying to ignore the way she’s realizing she is literally _wrapped_ in his scent. “ _Where are my clothes?”_

He doesn’t look even the least bit alarmed, jerking his head towards the fire where she now notices her clothes are laid out in front of it over a thick, fur rug. “Drying.”

“You _undressed_ me?”

He quirks an eyebrow. “Your clothes were soaked through. Would you rather I let you freeze to death?” He gives her a heavy look. “I didn’t touch you any more than I had to.”

“I—” Her mouth snaps closed as she ruminates on this, trying her damndest _not_ to blush as she wonders just how much he _had_ to touch her. “Okay,” she says finally with only a hint of pique. “But couldn’t you have given me some pants?”

“Don’t have any that fit you,” he says pointedly. His eyes make a lazy sweep down the length of her, causing heat to prickle in her chest. “You’re tiny.”

Her cheeks feel like they’re on fire, but under her vexation and her confusion she is noticing now the throbbing in her skull. She reaches to press her fingers to it, wincing at the tenderness there.

“Easy,” he tells her. “You hit your head pretty hard. Probably gonna be sore for a while.”

“If you hadn’t _scared_ me,” she grumbles.

His laugh is little more than a low rumble. “Some panicky thing pounding on my door when I come back with firewood? Thought you were trying to rob me.”

Her eyes flit about the room to his meager possessions. “Yes,” she mutters. “What a bounty.”

He ignores her barb with a twitch of his lips. “What are you doing out here, anyway?”

“I—” She reaches to close the gaping flannel at her chest, feeling too exposed under this observant Alpha’s gaze. “I have a development meeting tomorrow in Portland.”

“Development meeting?”

“Yes. I’m a civil engineer,” she explains. “I’m meeting with some developers about some condos.”

“Fancy.”

She purses her lips, noting the humor in his tone. “Yeah, well. This meeting tomorrow is—”

“Today,” he murmurs.

“What?”

“You have a meeting _today_ ,” he clarifies. “You slept through the night.”

Her mouth falls open. “I… lost an entire day?”

He nods. “You slept through the night.”

“ _Shit,_ ” she hisses. “Seriously?” She closes her eyes to let out an exasperated breath. “Great.”

“Where did you come from?”

She opens her eyes to find him still staring at her. “What?”

“I assume you live somewhere close.”

“Oh,” she says. “Astoria.”

“And you thought it would be a good idea to take 26 in this?”

“It’s the fastest route,” she huffs.

“Well,” he laughs, dropping his carving into his lap. “Didn’t do you a lot of good, now did it.” His laugh tapers off as his mouth dips into a concerned frown. “What happened?”

“I hit some black ice,” she sighs. "I lost control of the car, and it slid into the ditch.”

“Is it damaged?”

“I don’t… think so? It’s just stuck in the snow.”

He nods thoughtfully. “It wasn’t a good idea. You wandering out into the snow.”

“What was I supposed to do? Just wait for someone to find me?”

“I think you know what I meant.”

Her mouth opens just to close again, that same flush of heat creeping down her neck to spill into her chest. She _does_ know what he’s saying. Not that it’s a bad idea to wander in the snow, but more that it's a bad idea for _her_ to wander out in the snow.

An _Omega._

She presses her lips together, her unease growing as she realizes how very alone she is with this massive Alpha she knows nothing about. “Listen, I appreciate the, ah”—she glances down at the too-large shirt she’s clad in that is as worn as it is enticing in the way it wafts his scent into her nostrils even now—“clothes, and making sure I didn’t freeze to death, but if you could just let me use your phone to call a tow truck I’d be—”

“Don’t have one.”

“Excuse me?”

“Phone. I don’t have one.”

“ _What?”_ She finds herself colored with surprise. “What do you do when you need someone?”

“I don’t,” he says matter of factly.

“You don’t…?”

“Need anyone.”

_Wow, how bleak._

She huffs out a sigh. “Okay. Well. Where is my purse?”

His eyes flick over to her left, and she follows his line of sight to find her purse resting on a large cedar nightstand that matches his bed. She idly wonders if he carved it all himself. She grabs for her purse quickly, making sure to keep her bare legs covered in his quilt as she rifles through it for her cellphone, praying that it has even a _bar_ of service.

Not that it matters, since her phone is completely dead.

“ _Fuck,”_ she mutters. “No no _no.”_

Ben just watches her melt into a mild state of panic. “I can probably pull your car out of the ditch when the snow stops,” he offers, her hopes soaring with promise for the briefest of moments before they come plummeting down when he adds: “But you aren’t getting through either way for a few days. Storm really picked up last night. There’s at least seven inches over the roads right now.”

Her mouth parts in quiet dismay. “What does that—what does that _mean?”_

“I guess…” He gives her what she _thinks_ is a sympathetic look, but it’s hard to tell, with the gruff air he clings to. “Guess that means you're stuck here. For a little while.”

She thinks she’s gaping now, eyes moving around this tiny room, this miniscule space that hardly allows for privacy or space, and for the love of _god_ —there is only one bed. What the _fuck_ is she supposed to do here?

“Stay here?” She swallows. “With you?”

He jerks his head to a door behind him. “Bathroom’s that way.” He pushes up from the chair, and something flutters in her stomach, because he is _massive_ in a way that seems otherworldly. Even with the oversized furniture that fills the space—Ben Solo seems like a giant amidst his own things. It’s unnerving, to say the least. He doesn’t come closer, thankfully, pacing off in the other direction to the little kitchen. “You hungry?” He opens a cabinet to rifle through it. “I can cook you something. Imagine you must be, after all the shit you've been through.”

“Yes,” she says honestly, her stomach rumbling as if in answer now that the idea of food has come into play. “Food would be amazing.”

“Won’t be fancy,” he chuckles.

“Right,” she answers dryly. “It’s fine.”

She shifts a little in the bed, in _his_ bed—trying to inhale in a way that doesn’t bring too much of his scent into her nostrils—something like cedar and spice and freshly fallen snow—clearing her throat as the awkward question rests just on her tongue. 

“I hope this isn’t rude,” she starts carefully, hardly even able to breathe at this point. “Well, I’m sure it is, but…”

He turns from the cabinet, holding a can of some sort as he reaches into a drawer to draw out a can opener, giving her a curious look. “What?”

“It’s just…” She chews on the inside of her lip. “Are you not—do you not take—” She takes a deep breath, which makes her a little dizzy in a way she isn’t used to. She has _never_ scented anything like Ben Solo. She whispers the word like a secret. “ _Blockers.”_

He gives her that same long, heavy look, one that tells her nothing at all and only leaves her wondering what’s going on behind those dark eyes of his. “No,” he says finally, never tearing his eyes from hers. “I don’t.”

Her fingers clench at her sides. “Why? Isn’t that—isn’t that sort of—” She takes a steadying breath. “What about other people?”

“Don’t come across many,” he tells her. “Only go into town when I have to. Never had any problems before.” His mouth does something that makes her press her thighs together unconsciously, some rolling of his lips that she can’t look away from. “Does it… bother you?”

“N-no,” she says too quickly, the words falling out of her mouth in a breathless rush. “I could just tell. It doesn’t. Bother me. Not at all.”

He stares after her for a handful of seconds, finally seeming to accept this answer as he returns his attention to the can of mystery something that she’s apparently going to be consuming soon. Her unease wars with an undercurrent of some unwarranted interest, because there is a thought wriggling in the back of her brain. One that worms its way into the forefront of her mind, because she’s realizing now. The implications of everything he’s told her.

_You slept through the night._

_You slept._

_Through the night._

All the air in her lungs leaves her in a rush, the next inhale only making her predicament that much more dire.

Because she expected to be home by now. She expected to be back in Astoria and in her apartment and in her _own bed._ She certainly hadn’t had the prescience to bring her _suppressants_ with her on what should have been a _day trip._

Suddenly it’s a thousand degrees warmer in the room, and she thinks it has very little to do with the fire and almost _everything_ to do with the glaring realization that is currently ringing through her mind like a bell.

Because Rey _missed her dose,_ and what’s worse—she is now trapped in his cabin. She is _alone_ with this very strange, very _large_ Alpha that she knows nothing about. 

Nothing except the fact that he smells absolutely, _unequivocally_ delicious.

 _Shit_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> everything's perfectly all right now we're fine we're all fine here, now, thank you. 
> 
> how are you?


	2. i see a mountain in my way

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tropessss glorious tropessss theres definitely no plottt hereeee  
>   
> LUMBERJACK/SWEATER GOODNESS BY [COLOURISGREEN](https://twitter.com/colourisgreen)! 😍

She’s still trying to come to grips with the realization that she’s now on a biological countdown. 

It’s made worse with the way his scent literally _touches her skin_ —the soft flannel of his shirt feeling almost itchy and uncomfortable now, or maybe that’s just her. She resists the urge to bring the fabric to her nose and breathe it in, because the urge _is there_ —instead keeping her fingers clenched in her lap as she watches Ben throw a meal together. 

Watching him isn’t really much better, because the longer she looks, the _better_ he seems to look. She tells herself it’s hormones when her mind associates the soft appearance of his hair to the way it might feel between her legs. She reasons that it isn’t her fault when her eyes linger on the way his lips purse while concentrating, her brain forming a conjecture in regards to their pliancy if they were pressed up against hers. 

She swallows down past the growing lump in her throat, squirming a little in his bed as the movement amidst his quilt only stirs up more of his scent.

“You don’t have _any_ type of phone?”

He peeks up at her for a moment before returning his attention back to the pot in front of him. “Nope.”

“How is that possible?”

“I told you,” he says matter of factly. “Don’t need one.”

“I suppose it’s completely stupid to ask about WiFi then?”

He laughs a little. “I’m not one to call a lady stupid.”

She’s squirming again. She _really_ likes his laugh, even if her irritation makes it harder to acknowledge. She blows out a breath. “I can’t just… _stay_ here.”

“Would you like me to take you back to your car?”

There’s an edge of amusement to his tone that irritates her. Mostly. “People will worry about me,” she says reasonably. “If they don’t hear from me.”

He frowns at that. “Good point.” He sets the spoon down that he’s using to stir whatever is in his pot, scratching at the back of his neck. “I might have… hm.” He crooks a finger in gesture. “Come stir this.”

Her mouth parts a little at the idea of it, knowing her legs are completely bare underneath his flannel shirt. Plus, she’s still trying to come to grips with the way him crooking his finger at her makes her feel. “Can you toss me my pants?”

She doesn’t miss the way his eyes flit down the length of her, and she’s sure that _he_ doesn’t miss the way she shivers a little under his gaze. 

Traitorous hormones. 

He stalks across the space to the fire to retrieve her pants, tossing them in her direction as they land warm and dry in her lap. She immediately starts to shuffle out of the quilt to pull the denim over her legs, but it’s almost like his eyes have a heat to them, almost as if she can feel his gaze like an actual _weight_ —and she stalls with the tight denim in her hands, frozen with bated breath as he watches her for a good number of seconds. 

The spell is broken when he turns his back, having the decency to seem busy at the counter, even if Rey thinks it is more for decorum’s sake than anything else. She never takes her eyes off the broad expanse of his back as she shimmies back into her jeans, feeling less exposed without so much of her bare skin on display. His shirt still dwarfs her, the sleeves swallowing her arms even when she rolls them several times, the collar gaping so far that her breasts are in danger of being on display even while dressed. 

She feels a blush creeping up her neck, the full weight of realization hitting her, because she’s aware that he has already seen her, most likely. Her fingers trip over the button of her jeans as she imagines his large hands on her body, fingertips gentle as they peeled away every stitch of her clothing. She peeks over at him as she fastens the button, wondering what all he’s seen. Wondering if there’s any part of her that he _didn’t_ see. 

She shakes away these errant thoughts as she situates the loose disaster that is his shirt, doing her best to ignore the enticing scent that wafts up from it. She joins him in the kitchen that’s too small for _him_ , let alone them both—and it seems he senses her presence when he turns to give her a once over that she feels down to her toes. 

He hands her the wooden spoon in his hand and instructs that she stir the pot at his stove, and she peers down inside to notice some aromatic meat… something as she shoves the spoon down inside it. 

“What is this?”

“Deer chili,” he tosses over his shoulder as he stomps into the living room.

She wrinkles her nose. “ _Deer?”_

“It’s just meat,” he says flippantly. “Just like any other.”

She _heavily_ disagrees with that sentiment, but she stirs the thick concoction all the same, the smell admittedly stirring up the rumbling in her belly. She does her best not to steal glances at his broad back as he rifles through some chest in the corner of his living room, but she can’t say that she wins the battle when he bends at the waist to dig deeper, finding his ass in denim nothing short of delectable.

 _What is_ wrong _with her?_

She can’t remember ever being this affected by an Alpha before. She’s been around plenty at her job, and she can’t recall a single time that she’s felt an urge to climb one like a tree. 

Then again, she hasn’t met someone that so heavily falls in the _fuckable redwood_ category like Ben does. She tells herself it’s just her hormones, biting the inside of her cheek as she continues to stir and forcing her eyes to the pot as her stomach knots. 

_For the love of God, don’t think about knots._

“It’s been awhile since I’ve used it,” he’s saying, still rummaging through his cedar chest. “But I bet we can get it going.”

Her curiosity is piqued now, expecting a telegraph or a petrified carrier pigeon at this point—and what he pulls out isn’t much better. Probably. She can’t really say, given she has no idea what it is.

“What… is that?”

He carries it across the room to lay it out over his countertop. “Ham radio.”

“You’re kidding.”

“I never kid,” he deadpans, setting what she realizes now is a receiver upright as he fiddles with the archaic looking microphone that she assumes is the transmitter. “Only use it for emergencies.”

“When did you use it last,” she huffs. “World War 2?”

His jaw twitches with something that somewhat resembles the makings of a smile—but he otherwise ignores her grumbling.

“Desperate times,” he murmurs. “I’ll see if I can get it up and going after dinner.”

She looks into the pot she’s still stirring, trying not to grimace for politeness’ sake. “After the… deer chili.”

“Yep.” 

He moves behind her to take the spoon, and she can’t help the way she shudders a little when his big fingers brush against hers. He’s so large that even his casual proximity feels like crowding her in, his scent powerful and all-consuming and _so close_ —and she backs away in a hurry as she holds her breath, moving to put distance between them.

She wonders how he can be so unaffected, if he is simply made of sterner stuff or if it’s just _her_ that is lacking somehow (the latter thought makes something inside wither, much to her chagrin), and she has to bundle her wayward hormone-fueled emotions up into a little ball and bury them down deep as she tries to get a handle on what she’s feeling. 

She settles at his little table while he busies himself with grabbing bowls from his cabinets, doing her best not to watch him too closely, not to squirm when she ultimately fails in accomplishing her first goal. She can only hope that his archaic method of communication will come through after dinner, that she can wrangle someone willing to come rescue her before the worst happens.

 _Not that it would be so bad,_ she thinks errantly, _to see through a heat with this Alpha._ A little shiver passes down her spine as she imagines his big body covering hers. _Alpha is so big and strong and his hands would cover everything and his knot would fill and fill and fill and he would—_

She gives her head a shake as if this will free her from her wandering mind. She takes a deep breath, forcing herself to calm, telling herself that it will be fine. It will all be _fine._ She’ll get through it. Her eyes dart to the pot on Ben’s stove, her nose wrinkling slightly. 

She just has to get through the deer chili first.

* * *

Rey learns through dinner that Ben Solo doesn’t talk much.

She eats without complaint, genuinely grateful for his hospitality, but she can’t help the looming dread that colors her thoughts, knowing that the longer she stays here, the more likely she is to break down into a hormone-drunk state. She hasn’t told him yet that at any possible moment she could go from coherent to actively humping his leg, instead trying for casual conversation in an attempt to get to know her would-be rescuer a little better.

But Ben Solo, it seems, has very little to say about himself.

She thinks she’s most curious to learn how it is that he found himself out here in this self-imposed state of hermit-hood, still not quite able to wrap her head around the idea of being so secluded in the woods without a phone, and not to mention, _WiFi._

She doesn’t even think she remembers a single day in her life without WiFi, and here Ben is, filling his days with… what? Whittling? Building furniture too big for the average person? Talking to trees? 

She’s still trying to puzzle him out.

She’s watching him work on the ham radio from across the living room, curled up in his overly-large armchair by the fire as he fiddles with the settings on the receiver.

“So how long have you lived out here?”

He doesn’t look up at her. “A few years now.”

“Jesus Christ,” she huffs. “Do you go into town often?”

“Only when I have to.”

“But don’t you miss… people?”

He purses his lips. “Not really.”

“So you just, what—live off the land?”

He huffs out something that sounds like a laugh. “I’m curious as to how you imagine that playing out.”

“I mean…” Her brow furrows in thought, eyes moving over his broad shoulders and thick arms—the action having an unexpected side effect of making her squirm. “I don’t know. Do you kill _everything_ you eat?”

“Yes,” he deadpans, looking up to meet her gaze. “With my bare hands.”

His expression is stony for a good span of seconds, and then there’s a little twitch of his mouth that makes her roll her eyes. “Shut up.”

“It’s not as feral as you might think,” he laughs quietly. “I go into town a couple times a month, do odd jobs... Simple.”

“It just feels so…” She looks around the tiny cabin, frowning. “ _—lonely_. Out here.”

“Doesn’t bother me,” he says gruffly. She’s still having a hard time believing that, but maybe it’s just because it isn’t what she’s used to. He becomes pensive after a few moments, peeking up at her. “I used to live in Portland.”

“Really?”

“I was… an architect,” he tells her quietly. “Before.”

She blinks back at him, trying to reconcile this with the flannel-clad giant sitting across from her. “An architect.”

He nods. “Mhm.”

“”How did you…” She gestures aimlessly, not even quite sure where she’s going with this. “How did you end up _here?”_

He doesn’t take offense to her incredulous tone, just smiling in that barely-there way of his. “Just realized after a while that it wasn’t for me.”

“Most people take some classes at the Y when that happens,” she snorts. “They don’t take to the damn _woods.”_

That same smile that sort of makes her stomach flutter. “I like it out here. It’s quiet.” His eyes flick up to meet hers as warmth floods her chest. “Before you, that is.” He blessedly looks away before she begins to squirm, nodding down to the receiver. “I think this is good to go.”

She leans forward curiously. “How does it work?”

“You talk,” he tells her pointedly. “Someone answers.”

She frowns. “Thanks for the clarification.”

He shrugs. “It’s really as simple as that.”

“Okay, well…” She waves her hand aimlessly. “Do your thing, Paul Bunyan.”

Another little twitch at his mouth, but he says nothing as he reaches for the transmitter, leaning in as he presses the button at the base of the dated mic. “Mayday, mayday. This is K-Y-L-O, monitoring.”

He sets the mic back down on his coffee table, threading his hands together, and Rey cocks her head. “What now?”

“You wait for someone to answer.”

“But what if no one’s there?”

“Then we try again later.”

She raises an eyebrow as she peers down at the old machine that looks a little worse for wear. “Are you sure this old thing works?”

“This is a Swan,” he puffs out with an indignant breath. “It’ll outlive us both.”

Rey is _very_ skeptical of this, but she keeps her lips pressed tightly together. Ben leans back in as his large hand wraps around the tiny transmitter, bringing it back to his mouth. “KYLO. Anybody monitoring the 670? Have a minor emergency off 26. Need assistance.”

Rey hands grip her knees as she leans in even closer, mouth parted with suspense as she stares down at the old radio, as if the weight of her gaze might force it to life. Ben grips the transmitter in his hand as he frowns down at it, both of them huddled over the aged plastic, waiting for something from the other end.

The seconds tick by, and Rey feels frustration churning with each one that passes, just about to give up when—

“This is J6LWC, we read you, KYLO, what is your emergency?”

Rey breathes out a sigh of relief, thinking to herself that it’s going to be fine. She’s not going to devolve into an embarrassing state, she’s not going to climb the fuckable redwood and ride him till the bark falls off. She finds herself watching Ben’s mouth as he relays her information, chewing on her lower lip. 

Part of her is still wondering if climbing the tree that is Ben Solo would be such a bad thing. 

* * *

_Three days._

Rey is still reeling with the timeline given to them by what turned out to be the Multnomah County Sheriff's Department, dashing her hopes of a hasty rescue with the grim prediction of heavy snow through the end of the week. They promised to call Armie and Poe so no one thinks she’s dead—but told them not to expect a tow truck for _three days_ at least. 

_Three fucking days._

She’ll never make that. 

Even now she finds it difficult to get too near Ben, his scent seeming to grow more potent, seeming to dizzy her even _more_ with every passing moment. It feels more difficult with virtually nothing to pass the time, spending the last two hours watching Ben do a crossword while she randomly offered insight to various clues he was tripped up on. He’s in the shower now, and Rey can only watch the bleak gray outside growing darker and darker as she finishes up the last of Ben’s puzzle clues to pass the time. 

She’s been tortured with the sounds of his shower, clearly heard from the closed door of the bathroom only a feet away from her chair—forcing her to imagine what he might look like under the water. His clothes fit almost like they aren’t fit to contain him, and she can only _imagine_ what he looks like out of them. It leaves her tapping her foot restlessly and chewing at the end of her thumb, trying (and mostly failing) not to picture firm, wet skin packed into a shower that’s probably too small for him. It almost seems like _everything_ might be too small for Ben.

She swallows thickly, her traitorous mind wondering if _she_ might be too small for him. He’s so big after all—so broad and firm and just… _big_ —and she can’t help but imagine being pinned underneath him. Would he crush her, hands on her skin and body between her legs? Would she gasp for breath when his cock slots between her legs? Would she be—

She’s roused from _yet another_ bout of her mind’s horny antics when the water abruptly shuts off, her eyes burning a hole in the door as she is made aware of every sound of him moving around behind it. She’s holding her breath by the time the handle turns, and when the door opens—Rey nearly swallows her tongue.

Wet. 

He’s so _wet._

His chest is bare and shining with lingering bits of water, and there are flannel (why does he own so much fucking _flannel,_ and why is it so fucking _hot?)_ pajama bottoms slung low on his hips. Her eyes drink in all of this greedily before settling on the way his arm flexes with the motion of toweling his hair, and she notices a peek of ear through the wet strands, almost too big for him, and yet endearing somehow, softening his hard edges.

Her throat feels too dry, and her tongue feels too heavy—and it takes all she has not to _gape_ as he strides casually across the room to the dresser on the other side of his bed. He reaches inside for a plain, black t-shirt, and she isn’t sure if she’s relieved or disappointed to watch him shrug into it. 

He opens another drawer to frown into it, perusing for a moment before pulling out two more items. He shuts the drawer before tossing the wad of cotton at her, snapping her out of her stupor as she blushes down into her lap to unfold the bundle.

“Figure that’s all I have that will almost fit,” he tells her. “Probably more comfortable to sleep in.”

“Right,” she answers dazedly, noticing dark boxer shorts and a matching t-shirt. “Sleep.”

It probably takes her longer than it should, to be struck with the most crucial part of all this—and it’s like a lightning rod, when it finally does. Because it’s getting dark outside. It’s getting dark outside, and that means it will be time to _sleep_ soon. 

Her voice sounds all wrong. “Sleep?”

“Yeah,” he says evenly, not looking at her. She doesn’t know if she imagines the tension in him, wondering if this will be as uncomfortable for him as it is for her. “I can—” He turns to eye his bed warily. “I can sleep on the couch. If it’s too much.”

She eyes the couch across from her, noting how small it looks in comparison to him. “That wouldn’t be comfortable.”

“Got me through last night,” he says quietly, and when she doesn’t answer: “Or I could sleep in the shed, if that makes you more comfortable.”

“What? Of course not,” she says quickly. “I’m not kicking you out of your own house.”

“Wouldn’t be much of a bother,” he assures her, still not really looking at her, she notices. “Got an old pullout out there and a wood stove.”

She considers this for several seconds, contemplating if she will survive a night in the same bed as this Alpha who her brain can’t stop using to thrust her into lascivious daydreams against her will.

_Don’t think about thrusting, don’t think about thrusting, don’t think about—_

“It’s fine,” she says with more confidence than she feels. Her eyes flick to his bed. “It’s a big bed, after all.”

He looks at her then, and maybe she’s imagining it, but there’s something… darker to gaze. Something that makes her shift in the chair. “Right,” he says finally. “Alright then.”

His eyes follow her as she rises from his armchair, tracking her movement across the room and lingering even as she closes the door behind her. She leans against the wood for a moment as she tries to catch her breath, her heart hammering in her ribs as she imagines curling up under the thick quilt next to him on his bed. 

She closes her eyes as she clutches his clothes against her chest, ignoring the urge to press her nose to them. 

It’s going to be a long night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> imagine rey as that little dog drinking coffee at the table and the rooms on fire except the coffee is bens dick and you have an accurate depiction of where this story is going


	3. what I give, it takes away

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here’s nearly 3k words of actual leg jumping what is wrong with me  
>   
> This amazing gif board was gifted to me by [colourisgreen](https://twitter.com/colourisgreen) on Twitter! 😍

His hands are just as hot on her skin as she imagined they would be.

Calloused fingertips graze the inside of her thighs, his breath hot against her neck as another hand presses at her spine to arch her closer to his big body that feels warm and sweaty beneath her hands. 

She is so slick between her thighs that it should be embarrassing, but she can’t focus on anything outside of his tongue that teases the gland beneath her ear or his fingers as they curl between her legs to worsen the already-sticky state there. 

His palm covers the entire wet crease of her, giving her the hot pressure she craves more of even now, and she gasps as she rolls her hips to press her cunt further into his waiting hand. Fingers part her folds to tease, her slick coats them to make a mess, and she undulates unabashedly when he slips two inside, stretching and _filling_ —and still she wants _more._

She rocks her hips to take him deeper, his teeth grazing at her scent gland until she’s shivering with it, until she’s _desperate_ —and she thinks of how his knot will stretch her even more, how it will _fill_ her up. She wants it, _needs it_ —pleading for it in a tone she doesn’t recognize, begging for Alpha’s knot, gasping his name over and over and _over_ , and she—

It takes her several moments to collect herself when her eyes fly open. 

She’s disoriented in a way that only comes from waking in the middle of a very visceral, very _vivid_ dream—still half able to feel Ben’s hands on her skin as she blinks rapidly in an attempt to remember where she is. 

She remembers the awkward shuffle to Ben’s bed, remembers the way his eyes lingered briefly on her legs sprouting from his too-large boxers as she tucked herself under his quilt, the strained way he’d told her goodnight; she remembers _space_ between them.

There isn’t a shred of space between them now. 

She’s sweating under her clothes— _his clothes_ —and she thinks that's most likely because of the way Ben seems to absolutely _radiate_ heat. Her hands are sandwiched between them, pressed tightly against his chest, her head tucked just under his chin as one large arm drapes over her waist to cage her in. This isn’t the worst of it, no, not even _close_ —because there is a wide, _warm_ weight that is nestled between her thighs, a heavy pressure against her cunt that still throbs even now. 

She’s afraid to move, afraid to _breathe_ —realizing all at once that she is wet, and not in a way that she can hide. She is absolutely _drenched._ With horror she surmises what she’s done in her sleep, the pulsing heartbeat between her legs and the slick mess between her thighs making it all too obvious that while dream Rey had rode this Alpha’s hand without shame, _real_ Rey had rode this Alpha’s thigh with decidedly more so—at least now that she’s consciously aware of it. 

She holds her breath as she tries to determine if Ben is awake, if he _knows_ that she’s unconsciously used him like a human sex toy—her blood rushing in her ears from mortification and terror and what’s worse— _arousal._

Because she is still horribly, _overwhelmingly_ turned on. 

It’s not something she can help, she thinks, if the fevered flush of her skin is any indication. She thought she might have more time than this; in the past her heats have been organized, structured, _manageable_ even—never before reduced her to a state that couldn’t be handled by her knotted dildo and a good vibrator. 

_But this._

It’s like someone has set fire to her blood. As if the air in her lungs has been replaced with pure heat, making her throat dry and painful, her head pounding with a steady rhythm that is matched only by the one inside her cunt that positively _aches_ with a need for _something._

Something that she suspects might be related to the warm and thick Alpha currently wrapped around her. 

Her muscles ache with the way she’s forcing herself to remain still, closing her eyes as the throbbing at her core pulses hot with a need for relief. She thinks she means to try and untangle herself from him when she shifts slightly, but the resulting slide of her cunt against his thigh is _electric_ —forcing her mouth to part in surprise as her body shudders.

She would keep going, would keep pulling away from him, but there’s a hunger inside that’s nearly alien in its desperation, and she bites at her lower lip to keep from crying out as she rocks her hips ever so slightly, only meaning to seek a _little_ bit of relief.

But it’s like dry kindling to an inferno, consumed by the flame and only making it climb higher. It’s hardly a conscious thing, her rubbing back against his thigh to complete a full thrust. He doesn’t stir, and Rey takes it as divine intervention, slowly shifting back and forth to soothe the pressure while making it somehow completely and utterly _worse_.

She expels a shaky breath that ends on a sigh, and she doesn’t mean to curl her fingers in his shirt, doesn’t intend to press down against the hot, thick expanse of his thigh, but her body cries for _relief,_ and it feels so _good,_ and she just needs a little more, just a little more and she’ll—

He doesn’t really stir, when he comes to, but Rey senses it anyway. It’s a flex of his fingers at her hip, and a heavy draw of breath in his chest, a slight hiss at his mouth as the air rushes past his lips. Rey is frozen, _resolute_ —stuck between needing to keep going and _mortified_ that she’s done so at all. She can’t see the way his nostrils flare, but she can _hear_ it—and she wonders what she must smell like right now, her body near-feverish and her slick seeping through the shorts he gave her. 

“Rey.”

His voice is low, _warm_ , just like the rest of him, and she feels it licking deep inside her belly. 

“You—” His fingers press against her waist one by one, tight, as if he’s restraining himself. “Rey, you—Are you—”

He can smell it; she _knows_ he can. There isn’t any point in lying. “I-I’m sorry,” she says shakily. “I didn’t think—I thought I had—” She blows out an unsteady breath, her brain tripping over even the simplest of words, most of her primary senses homed in on his thigh that is still warm against her cunt. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” he says thickly. “It’s not—” A sharp inhale. “It’s not your—” Either his hands are shaking, or it is only her skin, vibrating with the force of how badly she needs to _move._ “— _fault_.” 

“I’ll just—” He smells good. He smells so fucking _good._ “Let me just—”

She tries to summon the strength to pull herself away, even as every cell in her body _revolts_ at the idea of not being close to him, of not being close to _Alpha._ She pushes at his chest, her breath catching when this tiny movement causes a delicious friction as wet fabric slides against the bare lips of her cunt. 

“ _Fuck.”_

She goes still, hearing the way Ben’s breath goes ragged. “I’m sorry—I’m trying to—I need to—”

“ _Don’t move.”_

She gasps in surprise when every muscle in her body goes rigid, a shiver passing over her as she immediately gives in to the compulsion of his command. She’s not even sure he realizes he’s _done_ it. She’s never heard an Alpha command, always thought it was testosterone-fueled bullshit, thought she would rip an Alpha _apart_ for using it on her—but she feels none of that now. Now her silly brain begs for him to instruct her in all things. She wants to hear him demand that she peel off these clothes. Wants to hear that low timbre murmuring things like _spread your legs_ and _good girl_ and all sorts of nonsensical things flitting through her mind at this moment. 

But she keeps still, because Alpha told her to, and she _desperately_ wants to please him, for reasons she can’t even begin to understand. 

He draws in a shuddered breath, his thigh trembling between her legs and doing nothing for her current state. When he moves, when he tries to pull away—she can _feel_ it. She’s not sure how she missed it before, isn’t sure when it happened, but Ben is hard. Ben is _incredibly_ hard. She can feel the rigid length of him against the underside of her arm, the tip (she thinks, judging by the wet patch) bumps against her _wrist,_ The implications of that nearly make her crumple in his arms. What it would _feel_ like inside her. 

“I’m sorry,” he grinds out. “Just… give me a minute.”

What he’s saying is sensible—but Rey is rapidly descending into a state that is less so. Her heart still pounds in her chest and her ears and between her legs, and she closes her eyes, desperately trying to cling to any scrap of rationality that she might have left. 

“I’m going to just—” She can hear him swallow, like it’s difficult. “I’m going to move,” he tries again carefully. “And then we’ll just— _fuck._ ”

It isn’t part of his plan, she thinks, when she tries to beat him to the punch, when she rebels against his command in order to shift away. It brings her cunt along his thigh in a wet, warm slide, and the sound she makes, the sound _he makes_ —it makes her want to do it again.

So she does.

“ _Rey,”_ he hisses. “What are you—”

“I’m sorry,” she says dazedly, “I can’t—I just need— _I’m sorry.”_

“I can—I can feel you— _fuck, I can feel you—”_

His fingers release her waist, bumping against her arm as he draws them inward, and she can _feel it_ —when he brings them over his clothed cock to press there. He hisses out a breath—one of relief or pain, she isn’t sure—and for a moment she keeps still just to catalogue the way his hand begins to move subtly between them, _touching_ himself. She wonders if he feels it, this dizzying fog that seems to rule her senses, and she bites at her lip as she gives a deliberate roll of her hips to thrust against his thigh. 

She still isn’t sure how they ended up like this, isn’t even sure it _matters_ —she is only sure of the tiny flicker of relief she feels when she takes from his body. She turns up her face until her nose presses to the base of his throat, and it’s wanton, the way she takes a deep inhale like an addict looking for a fix. One of her hands fists in his shirt, letting the other hang loose so that her fingers catch every movement of his hand as it starts to stroke up and down his cock. 

She finds herself wanting to see, wanting to see and taste and touch Alpha’s knot, let him fill any part of her he likes, let him do _whatever he wants_ —as long as he takes the ache away. 

“Ben,” she breathes, rocking her cunt against him a little harder. “I can’t—”

“I can _smell_ you, Omega,” he rumbles, his voice seeming to drop an octave, hardly even sounding like himself. “I can smell how wet you are.”

“Wet,” she echos airly, grinding down a little as he presses up harder between her legs in a nearly imperceptible way. “Yes.”

“Is that—” She can hear a sound that nearly threatens to do her in, one of skin against skin, and she knows, she _knows_ that he’s worked his hand inside his pajama bottoms. That he’s touching himself in earnest now. “Is that because of me?”

She bites her lip, some part of her refusing to let her admit it; she doesn’t even _know_ him. It still doesn’t stop her from actively fucking the broad expanse of his thigh. She buries her face at the base of his throat instead of answering, frantically breathing in deep lungfuls of his scent. There’s a rumble in his chest, something like a rough purr she feels deep down in her belly, and her cunt clenches uselessly with a want of something to fill it. 

“You didn’t tell me,” he goes on in a rasp. “That you were close.”

“I didn’t”—she gasps when the head of his cock nudges against her arm to leave a sticky mess there—“know. I only missed”—she can’t help it, pushing her fingers under the elastic band of his boxers—“ _one dose.”_

“You smell”—she can hear the deep inhale, almost _feel_ the way he’s breathing her in—“ _ripe,_ Omega.”

It’s an all-over shiver, that one word. Her toes curl and her mouth parts, eyes hooded as her fingers find the slick crease of her cunt to tease through her folds. Just a swipe against her over-sensitive clit makes her whimper. When she begins to roll her fingers against it—she can feel her knuckles brushing against the back of his hand as he pumps his cock harder, works himself _faster._

“I’m sorry,” she says airily, not even sure what she’s sorry for now. “I’m sorry, Alpha.”

A thick arm winds underneath her, wrapping around to crush her against him as his nose presses to her hair. “ _Shh,”_ he soothes. “Come if you need to. Does it hurt?”

She nods heavily. “Hot. It’s so _hot.”_

“Come,” he urges. “It will help. You’re doing so _good_ , Omega.”

Her limbs tremble with his praise, curling three of her fingers inside as her palm grinds against her clit, filling her somewhat even though it’s not _nearly_ enough. She works them in and out, her slick making a wet mess of her hand, _ruining_ Ben’s boxers—but she doesn’t think he’ll mind. She feels his hand working his cock at a furious rhythm now, and she thinks he won’t mind in the _slightest._

He’s still shifting his thigh to grind it up against as much of her cunt as he can, sometimes trapping her hand between her legs with her fingers as deep inside her as she can manage them. She feels his lips at her hair, feels his breath at her temple, and she doesn’t care that she doesn’t know his middle name, couldn’t give two _fucks_ that he doesn’t know hers—she’s going to come. She’s going to come _just like this._

His breath is ragged and muscles taut, and Rey is little more than instinct and sensation now, pressing as close as she can, _taking_ as much as she’s able—desperate to feel that bit of relief that she knows an orgasm will bring. Her skin is hot, her cunt aches, and somewhere deep down she recognizes that this is only the _beginning_. She knows this will only get _worse._

But this is a worry for after.

There’s a pressure building, one that she feels in her belly and her cunt and _everywhere_ . It’s an instinct, a feeling, one she can’t ignore; her tongue flicks out to taste the warm salt of his throat, sliding higher until there’s a burst of something else, something like warm spice and chilled snow, and she laps at it, taking from it _greedily_ —humming against his skin as a strangled moan tears out of him. 

She feels the way he shudders, feels the warm, thick splash of his cum along her arm, and there is a part of her, some primal part that might embarrass her at any other time, that mourns the waste of it, that wishes it were in her mouth or her womb. 

_Where it belongs,_ something purrs.

The insanity of this is lost to the way she begins to shake, whimpered sounds falling from her mouth as she finally, _finally_ reaches the blessed respite that her climax brings—like a full body sigh that she feels in every muscle, every nerve-ending, every _cell_ —and she melts into his chest as she trembles through it. 

Her thighs are sticky, his boxers absolutely _drenched,_ but this doesn’t register. Not yet, at least. She’s still trying to catch her breath.

It isn’t until the heavy rise and fall of his chest begins to slow, isn’t until his cum on her skin begins to cool—that the gravity of what has just happened comes crashing down.

His cum is on her skin. Hers is soaking into his clothing. She met him _today._

Shit.

Shit. Shit. _Shit._

She should have let him sleep on the damn couch.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We are skidding into trashville at full speed now but also  
>   
> LOOK AT THIS INCREDIBLE ART FROM [THERISEOFSWOLO](https://twitter.com/theriseofswolo)! REY’S EXPRESSION AND BEN’S LARGENESS IT IS TOO PERFECT FOR WORDS BUT ARE WE SURPRISED IT’S CLAIRE 😭😭❤️❤️❤️


	4. show me the foothold

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HELLO. I meant to upload this this morning, but my fever came back (I have the flu 🤧) and that set me back. BUT HERE WE ARE. Fair warning, filling the "explicit hand holding" tag proved to be a weird one. Lmao. I hope it works. 😅  
>   
> I am loving these sweater gif boards by [colourisgreen](https://twitter.com/colourisgreen)! 😍  
> ALSO:  
>   
> GUYS I HAVE NO WORDS IT'S PERFECT, IT'S HORNY, IT'S EVERYTHING I DREAMED. [theriseofswolo](https://twitter.com/theriseofswolo) owns my entire heart and soul and ass till death. Period.

Her heart hammers in her ears for a different reason now, the dizzying fever of her impending heat dying down to a simmer and leaving her aghast with what she’s done. She can still feel the wet disaster between her legs, feel his chest moving beneath her hand, his heart thudding away beneath it as evidence of the exertion he’s just spent with what they’ve done.

She’s afraid to pull back and look at him, afraid of what she’ll find on his face when she finally does. 

She holds her breath as she pulls her hand from beneath his boxer shorts, grimacing at the slick that clings to her fingers and between them as she withdraws it. She is doing her _very_ best not to think about the thick Alpha cum that is still cooling along her arm. She braces her hands along the base of his thigh, and they both gasp as she slides away, the sodden fabric between them making her still-sensitive cunt glaringly obvious. 

Her glands throb even now, evidence that this is only the beginning, that this is only a _brief_ reprieve of what’s to come—and she’s holding her breath when she turns up her face slowly, if only to save herself from the assault that she knows his scent will bring. His lips seem fuller when they’re pressed together like this, his eyes as wild and dark as she imagined they would be, and his nostrils flare with every breath as he slowly peels his fingers from her skin.

For a moment neither of them speak, the sounds of their breath mingling in the minimal amount of space between them. Rey closes her mouth just to open it aimlessly, searching for words that don’t come, suspended in a moment in which she can’t discern how to feel. It’s not her fault, she thinks, her only crime is not mentioning this possibility sooner, but it doesn’t keep her from feeling a flicker of embarrassment because: _what they’ve just done._

She draws in a heavy breath just to let it out, and she’s going to say something, she has to say _something,_ she—

“You’re close,” Ben says tightly, beating her to the punch.

Her mouth snaps shut, staring up into those dark eyes of his, nodding slowly. 

“I’m assuming that you don’t”—his throat bobs heavily with a swallow—“want my help?”

Something inside her recoils, something unconscious and old that mourns that _Alpha doesn’t want her_ —but she manages a quiet, “I don’t?”

“Because we just… met.” There’s a slow inhale before he tumbles past his lips shakily. “Unless…?”

“No,” she says quickly, even as some part of her brain _revolts_ at her rash decision. “No, of course. You’re right. I’m sorry.” There is a collective gasp from them as they untangle themselves, and Rey pushes up quickly to put wanted distance between them. At least, she thinks it’s wanted. She can’t be sure with the way there’s a sinking feeling in her belly. “God, Ben. I’m _so_ sorry.”

He pushes himself up as well, chewing on the inside of his lip as his eyes dip briefly down the front of her before returning to her face. “I can’t stay here,” he says roughly. “If I stay here, there’s no way we won’t…”

Her cheeks heat, knowing he’s right. She’s having a hard time keeping from scaling his branches even now. Her eyes dart to the curtains, noticing they’re still dark, knowing it’s still the dead of night. “But what will you…?

“The shed,” he answers quickly, his fingers clenching the blankets below him to fist there, and she wonders if this is as difficult as it is for her, being so close. “I told you. Couch. Stove.” His words are clipped, like it’s difficult to get them out. “I’ll be okay.”

“But this could last for—”

“ _Days,”_ Ben breathes. 

He’s looking at her in a way that makes her belly warm and her thighs press together, almost like he’s imagining spending them in a very different way than they are currently discussing. Rey can’t pretend she isn’t doing the same thing, having a difficult time restraining herself from cleaning away his spend from her arm with her _tongue_ —an urge that both horrifies and thrills, depending on which part of her you ask. 

“Are you—” She rolls her lips together, willing herself not to look down at the front of his pajama bottoms. “Are you sure that you’ll be okay?”

“Yes,” he says a little tightly. “I’ll be… okay. I just need”—his nostrils flare with his inhale, and she doesn’t miss the way his lashes flutter a little, the way he breathes her in—“distance.”

“I’m sorry,” she whispers again. 

Ben shakes his head. “It’s going to be okay, Omega.” She shivers right down to her hips, squirming as his eyes go wide, and his mouth parts in realization of what he’s said. “I mean… Rey.”

She nods heavily, shifting a little in his bed as she is made all too aware of the soggy state of his boxers. She grimaces as she glances down in her lap, wrinkling her nose. “I don’t suppose you have anything else that will fit me,” she sighs.

Ben gives a slow shake of his head. “Just what you had before.”

Rey blows out a slow breath as Ben slowly slides off the bed, thinking to herself that it can’t get much worse. She eyes the broad expanse of his back as he gives it, a single throb in her cunt reminding her of what a mistake it thinks she’s making for sending him away.

She wonders if that’s true.

* * *

It’s the second time she’s stepped out of his shower in the last few hours, only this time, there’s a lingering regret that she thinks isn’t actually born from her. She reminds herself that it is only her hormones that mourns the loss of his fluids on her skin. She dries off on a towel that smells too much like him, resisting the urge to press it to her nostrils and shrugging into the too-large flannel shirt as quickly as possible. It hangs nearly to her knees just as before, and she frowns at the way it swallows her wholly, like a child playing dress up. Does he have to be so damned _big?_

Even with the steam of the shower, the bathroom air feels cool on her skin, and a quick press of her wrist to her forehead reveals that she is flushed and warm herself. She can hear Ben moving about in the other room, and she is still having a hard time with the idea of facing him. There is still embarrassment, of course, but underneath that there is this gnawing uncertainty at having declined any offer of helping her. 

She knows they just met, knows that she knows nothing about him, not really. _Of course_ it was the right call to refuse help.

So why is she wavering now?

She thinks it is just her inner Omega that prods her with this doubt; she’s never had any issues seeing herself through her heats before. In twenty-six years, she has _never_ felt the unbearable need of an Alpha to get her through. 

Okay, so they haven’t been just _wonderful_ or anything—but it’s a heat. They’re not supposed to be _enjoyable_ … right?

She thinks back to Ben’s voice in her ear, and his hand on her skin… and she wonders if that’s true. She wonders if an Alpha, particularly _this_ Alpha, would somehow make her heat something more than something she just bears through. She thinks of his breath and his warmth and his _scent_ —and she wonders what it might be like if she let him _help_ her. She’s assaulted by images of his big body, warm and bare and _moving_ over hers—and she expels a shaky breath as she tries to rein it in, reaching with trembling fingers to grip the doorknob and leave the bathroom. 

He’s behind the couch when she steps out, dressed in warmer clothing with a wooden crate of random supplies she can’t make out. She hates the idea of kicking him out of his own home, and her fingers clench and unclench the soft flannel at her thighs nervously as his eyes dip down to her bare legs. 

“I’m sorry,” she tells him for the thousandth time. “For all of this.”

He shakes his head, his eyes painting a heavy path up the length of her to settle on her face. “Can’t be helped.” His jaw tenses as he takes a deep breath jerking his head towards the bed. “I put fresh sheets on the bed. I know they probably… smell like me.” He gives her an apologetic look. “But maybe that will… help?” He clears his throat when he notices her mouth part, barreling on. “Speaking of, I left some more of my clothes on the bed. I didn’t know if you… nested.”

Her cheeks flame with mortification. “That’s… That’s unnecessary. I don’t—I don’t need to _nest.”_

He shrugs in a _suit yourself_ motion. “Just thought I’d offer.”

He moves as if to cross the room, and her feet move in tandem like two ends of a magnet, circling around the living room to keep space between them as he plods towards the bathroom, for more supplies, she thinks.

He gives her one last lingering look before he ducks inside, and she breathes a sigh of relief as she quickly shuffles to the bed to hide her bare legs beneath the quilt. Her eyes flick to the pile of flannel (more fucking _flannel_ )—chewing on the inside of her lip and squirming restlessly as his scent wafts up from it. Just breathing it in gives her a brief sense of relief, even if only just, and she realizes her fingers are stretching towards the pile without her making a conscious effort to do so. 

They hang inches away as she catches herself, and she frowns as she draws them back with a scowl. She doesn’t need to _nest._ She’s never nested before. Never even felt the _urge._ Still… his clothes do smell… _incredible_ —if she’s being honest. She reaches again to press her fingers to the soft fabric, marveling at how the worn cloth sends a tingling sensation through the tips of them. She presses her lips together as she curls her fingers to fist it in her hand, all the while reminding herself that she doesn’t need it, that she will be _just fine_ —repeating it in her mind over and over even as she pulls an old shirt into her lap, and then another. 

She’s grumbling under her breath about _Alpha nonsense_ and how she _absolutely doesn’t need to nest_ and _she’s not just some simpering little Omega_ —and before she knows it there are shirts draped over her thighs, one slung over her shoulders to hang from either side, even pressing the sleeve of one against her cheek as she rubs it there unconsciously. She finds herself blinking down at what she’s done dazedly, hardly remembering how it happened.

This is how Ben finds her when he steps out of the bathroom, eyes widening from across the room as he takes in her frazzled and flanneled state. She looks down at the making of the _very_ thing she’d been adamant she didn’t need, and her mouth turns down in a frown as she flicks her eyes up to narrow them.

“Don’t say a word,” she warns.

Ben’s lips remain firmly pressed together, looking as if he had no plans to do so. He doesn’t even seem to be aware of the irony of the situation, eyes roaming over his clothes that she’s maddeningly clad herself in with an expression that makes her press her thighs together. As if he _likes_ seeing her this way. He averts his eyes as he quickly carries the items in his hands to the crate, keeping them fixed on the contents and not on her. There’s unease in her belly, guilt that still lingers there, and she wrestles with it for several moments as he pulls a blanket from the cedar chest. 

“Are you sure this is okay?” Her thumb circles the wooden edge of one of his buttons, the action soothing somehow. “I mean… are you going to be okay out there?”

He lifts the crate to pull it to his chest, nodding softly. “Stayed out there while I was building the cabin,” he tells her. “I’ll be fine.” He finally looks at her then, and she feels the weight of it like fingers pressing against her skin, something that she knows the feeling of now. She holds her breath as he stares back at her, feeling the flush in her chest spread higher, _deeper._ “Are you sure that you’ll be okay in… here?”

She swallows, reading his meaning even if he doesn’t spell it out. She knows he’s offering again, offering to _help_ —and she falters for a moment because even though she knows she shouldn’t, there is a growing part of her that urges her to say _yes,_ to take what he’s offering. It isn’t like she’ll ever see him again, she thinks. Isn’t as if it would even _matter_ in the grand scheme of things—but there’s something about Ben that unsettles her. Something that hardly even has anything to do with him, but _everything_ to do with what he does to _her._ She can’t seem to find her balance, when he’s near, can’t seem to get her wits about her, and it isn’t something she’s used to. Isn’t something she knows how to _deal_ with.

“I’ll be okay,” she murmurs back. “In here.”

Even as she says it, something inside scoffs with disbelief, but she keeps her lips firmly pressed together, clinging to the tiny scrap of resolve she has left. 

“Okay.” Ben nods before he crosses the room, stilling in front of his front door to give her one last look over his shoulder. “Well… you know where I’ll be. If you… need anything.”

 _If you need my knot,_ he doesn’t say.

Not that he has to. 

The wind is cold when he pries open the door, and in the moonlight beyond she can see a light snowfall coming down as he steps out onto the porch. She watches him close the door, ignoring the strange urge inside to stop him from going—only able to really breathe again when she’s alone. Alone with nothing but the warmth of the fire and the heat of his scent that still tickles her nostrils. She lies down on her side to bury her face in his shirt, closing her eyes to draw in a heavy breath, one that strangely settles the buzzing that seems to be sparking under her skin.

Even now she can feel the churning in her belly, feel the heat blooming between her legs that warns of what’s to come—and she can’t tell if it’s made better or worse with the way she’s actively breathing him in. She can’t tell much of anything, with the way it makes her dizzy, something that is slowly becoming a craving, like a high that electrifies her nerve endings and leaves them lit up like a livewire. 

Even with the pounding of her heart and the fogginess of her head, she feels her eyes drooping with fatigue, the events of everything that’s happened in what is essentially the dead of night leaving her heavy and drained. Her lashes flutter closed, and her limbs grow laxed, and she slowly drifts off to sleep with limbs warm and nostrils full of her Alpha’s scent. 

_Not her Alpha,_ her languorous mind corrects. 

Her thoughts flit to the big, strong Alpha with his low voice and his large hands and his dizzying scent, thinks of him so close and yet _so far_ away by her own choice, and no, she thinks. He isn’t her Alpha. 

Not even close.

* * *

It’s early when she wakes again, or still late, she isn’t sure. 

The curtain’s are still dark, and Ben’s bed is still empty, and everything is mostly the same—except that the room seems to be a thousand degrees warmer now. There is sweat at her temples and her neck and _everywhere_ else, and the air in the room feels dry, burning her throat with every breath. 

She kicks off his quilt only to notice a stickiness between her thighs, and her attempt to move brings about a sharp cramp deep in her belly that only worsens the situation. She presses them together to try and staunch the ache there, biting at her lip as she turns her head unconsciously to press her nose to Ben’s pillow. 

She can smell him there—a mixture of his shampoo and his detergent and just _him_ —a burst of warm spice with a tinge of fresh snow that is so soft it is like being wrapped in a plush blanket, enveloped in _Alpha_ and still wanting _more._

She finds herself rubbing her wrists into the worn flannel that covers them, his scent blending with hers like a drop of relief to the growing blaze that courses under her skin. She brings the end of the sleeve to her throat to rub there, gasping when his scent seeps into her glands like a balm to ease the ache, to cool the burn, even if only briefly. She turns her head to let her tongue press to the soft fabric, her lashes fluttering as his flavor explodes across her tongue, bringing about a fresh gush of slick below.

She doesn’t exactly mean to bring his sleeve to the soaked center of her, in her rapidly dizzying state she thinks she means only to deliver a bit of pressure to relieve the throbbing—but his shirt is saturated in him, and her body seems to _know_ when there is an Alpha between her legs, even if only the scent of one. Her cunt pulses as more of her slick dribbles out to soak Ben’s sheets, and Rey whimpers low in her throat as she curls her fingers inside in a vain attempt to soothe some of the burning, his clothes that are so drenched in his scent making everything better but somehow so much _worse._

There’s something different about this heat, like the difference between a drizzle and a downpour—and Rey feels like she is _drowning_ in it now. Every inch of her skin aches, every hollow throbs, and when she closes her eyes there is a steady rhythm in her head, like a drum, beating away with an endless taunting of urges to _find her Alpha._

And there is still a part of her that feebly argues he isn’t hers, that she doesn’t _know_ him, not really—but it is lost to the pounding in her head and her chest and deep, _deep_ inside where she needs him. Where she needs to be _filled_. 

She isn’t really sure when she slid out of his bed, when she stumbled to her feet, but she’s there now—moving across the room in a staggered shuffling of her feet to bring her closer and closer to the door. She isn’t sure where she’s going, except she does, because _Alpha is outside_ , and it seems her instincts control her feet now, guiding her where she needs to go.

There is a burst of cold air even in the seemingly still night, the chilled air rushing in through the open door as the snow gleams in the moonlight. She thinks she should be cold, with her legs and feet bare like they are—but all she feels is the burning heat that lives in her skin and her blood and _deeper still_ as if her very bones emanate warmth at this point. She can spot the little wooden shed across the front yard, can see a soft glow from the window that promises _Alpha_ —and she steps across the porch in a daze, only registering what she’s doing when her foot drops into freezing snow that is such a shock it is like a knife to her skin. She hisses out a breath as she pulls it out in a flash, shivering all over as the cold begins to cut past the fire in her body. She grits her teeth as she pushes onward, her good sense seeming to have burned up back in his bed that she can still scent even now, even out _here_. Her feet slide into the powdered snow, and there’s some part of her that tells herself not to do this, to _turn back_ —but it is lost to the rhythm of _Alpha Alpha Alpha_ that thumps inside with every heartbeat. 

Even when the snow touches her knees ,she keeps going, ignoring the biting cold in search of the one thing that her instincts crave, that they _beg_ for. She stumbles over something beneath the snow, falling to her knees and trembling in the cold, trying to push herself back to a standing position even though it’s difficult. Her teeth chatter and her limbs ache, but still there is that burning inside, that throbbing that spreads from her belly to every part of her body to rule her senses.

Her muscles burn with the effort, and her throat feels like it’s on fire, and everything is _so cold_ and yet _so hot_ , and she’s realizing how stupid this was, as she opens her mouth to utter his name, as she repeats it a little louder—but her head spins, and her feet feel like lead. She feels her mouth moving, hears some distant yell that she thinks is her own voice, pleas for _Alpha_ even as her vision darkens. Her fingers and toes are going numb, and she’s realizing how stupid she was, how she let her Omega instincts get the better of her. 

She’s nearly given up on moving altogether, when she feels the snow shifting around her, when she feels strong arms curling under her body to lift her up. Something large holds her head to crush her face against warmth and spice and _Alpha_ —and she breathes in deep lungfuls as the heat of it seems to rob her of the chill wrought by the snow. It melds with the steady burn that lives deeper, stoking that fire inside until she's squirming in his hold.

She recognizes when cold gives way to the warmth of his cabin, hears the door shutting behind them as colors whiz by to blend together until everything slows before the fire that still burns in his hearth. His hands are working over her legs to rub life into them as he spreads her over the thick fur rug there, and there might be a part of her that recognizes that what he’s doing is necessary, that he _has_ to—but it doesn’t change the way she feels herself growing hotter with his touch. 

“You’re in— _fuck_ , you’re really—” She hears him make a sound that is little more than a growl, and his hands tremble as they try to rub warmth back into her feet. “The way you _smell.”_

She’s grabbing for his shirt, trying to pull him closer, and she can’t figure out why he’s resisting, why he’s making it so _difficult._ “Alpha,” she breathes. “ _Alpha, please.”_

“You’re not—” His grip is tight around her wrists as he tries to pull them away from his chest. “Not thinking clearly. Remember? You didn’t want—”

She makes a frustrated sound, scrambling up to her knees as she brings her face as close to his throat as she’s able. “ _Alpha.”_

She feels him shiver. “Rey. _Rey._ You said you didn’t—”

She’s getting tired of his talking, his words bringing her anything but the _relief_ she actually needs. Maybe she takes him by surprise, when she lunges. Maybe his guard is down, she can’t be sure—but there’s a sense of satisfaction, when he topples backwards, allowing her to scramble over his big body to bring herself closer.

His eyes are wide, and his hands are idle in the air, but she is more focused on the denim between her legs, tightening with every second that she grinds down against it. Ben hisses between his teeth as she rolls her hips with a sigh of relief, his spread fingers curling to clench, reaching for her only to draw them back.

“ _Rey.”_

She’s not really listening, too focused on the way she can feel him growing hard against the wet crease of her. She preens at this, practically purring, because _Alpha wants her too_ —and she’s reaching for the button even as he continues to voice his concerns. He doesn’t stop her though, and unless she’s mistaken, it almost feels as if his voice is getting deeper, some edge to it that licks low in her belly, and she hums contently as her fingertips brush against dark hair beneath the fly of his jeans.

She knows he’s looking out for her, knows that his gentle protests are for her benefit—but the Rey that told him she didn’t need his help isn’t here right now. _That_ Rey didn’t know what in the fuck she was talking about, as far as _this_ Rey is concerned. Now there is only the promise what he can give her; now there is only his _knot._

His words die on his lips when she finally wrestles him out of his underwear, her eyes widening because _fuck._

She’s never seen a knot before.

There’s no reason for it, not really, none except she’s never been particularly _interested_ in seeing one. The Alpha’s she’s met thus far have been hot-headed, hormone-driven assholes, mostly. She’s never met one that made her dizzy, never came across one that made her heart race and her knees weak. Can’t recall a single one whose voice makes her breathless. 

But _Ben_ does.

And she thinks that might be a sign she’d ignored until now, thinks that although her mind is foggy with heat, she might actually be thinking _clearly_ for the first time since they met. Some part of her even wonders if she was _meant_ to meet him—but she thinks that’s most likely just her hormones. 

“Rey,” he grinds out. “What about—”

She wraps her fingers around his cock, his words cutting off as his head falls back against the floor, and there’s a prickling disappointment in her chest with his protest. “You don’t… want me?”

“I—” His chest rises and falls rapidly, stretching the buttons of his flannel—that fucking _flannel_ —as he peers up at her with rapidly-darkening eyes. “I don’t”—he draws in an unsteady breath—“want you to regret it.”

_Regret it?_

She looks down at his cock in her hands, long and thick and _hard_ —and she smoothes her thumb over the slightly swollen knot that distends only inches away from the base of him. She’s thinking about how it will feel inside her, thinking about the way she knows it will swell to _fill_ her; there isn’t a _single_ thought in her head in this moment about regret. She gives him a light squeeze, stroking her fist upwards, mesmerized by the thick beads that dew at the head. 

Ben draws in a ragged breath when she slides her fist down to the base only to drag it up again, her eyes flicking from the wet head of him to his face to catch the tortured expression there. “I know what I said,” she says hoarsely, shifting a little in his lap as he sucks in a breath. She presses her thumb just under the flared lip of his glans, watching his eyes roll back. “I changed my mind.”

The pad of her thumb smears the sticky wet of his precum, feeling a frenetic energy building inside with a need for _more_ —more of everything Alpha can give her. 

She catches his tongue dip out, watching as it slides across the plush pink of his lower lip. “You changed your mind?”

His cock throbs in her hand, and she doesn’t miss the way his eyes darken. She doesn’t answer, only gives him another slow stroke, enjoying the swell of his knot against her palm. His eyes flick down to watch as she touches him, his lashes fluttering for a moment before he reaches out to wrap her small hand in his larger one. His fingers are calloused and rough as they slide over the back of her hand, sending little sparks through her skin as she squeezes tighter instinctively.

She only loosens her grip when he urges her too, letting her hand go a little slack before his thick fingers wind through hers. He keeps their fingers threaded together even as he lets their hands settle back around his cock, and he watches as he guides them down the length of it, their palms wrapped around either side. He squeezes her fingers as he pulls her hand back up, subsequently forcing them to squeeze the already-swollen makings of his knot before he continues on to let their palms slide over the head. 

She can feel him there, wet and warm against her hand, and she can only watch as if in some sort of trance as he keeps up the pace, gradually working himself faster and _faster_ —his mouth slack and his eyes hooded as if spellbound himself. There is a part of her that wants to stop this, mourning the opportunity to let him slide inside _her_ rather than her fist—but she can’t seem to pull her hand away, can’t seem to focus on anything but the way the soft skin of his cock moves over the hard length beneath. 

She bites her lip, breathing deep as his scent blooms in the air to dizzy her further, sensing his pleasure and letting it roll over her, wanting to _please_ him in a way she’s never wanted to please anyone. His breath is coming shorter and shorter with every stroke, his cock throbbing in their hands as he shows her how to touch him, how to _please_ him. 

And she knows after he’ll take care of her, can _sense_ it—without even really understanding _how_ she knows. So she lets him guide her hand as he holds it, ignoring the ache in her cunt briefly even as her slick makes a mess between them, focusing only on the hot throbbing of his cock as he works it faster, forces her to touch him _more_ —over and over until he’s nearly gasping for breath, until he’s tilting up his hips to seek _more_ —and he’s close, she can _feel_ it. Just a little more, a little more, and he’ll—

It’s wet, _hot_ —when he comes against their threaded fingers, and there is _so much_ of it. He curls his fingers inward to force both their hands to cup the pulsing head of his cock, his cum pooling against their palms to coat there. She watches him bite at his lower lip, watches the hard length of him twitch, watches his knot _swell_ before her very eyes—and she swallows around a dry lump because she _wants_ it. Possibly more than she’s ever wanted anything. 

Or maybe that’s just hormones. 

She’s not really sure it matters at this point. 

It’s sticky and warm when he pulls their hands away, and her mouth parts when he flexes his fingers, watching as he works his cum between their hands. He’s staring as he finally, _finally_ unthreads their fingers—pulling his hand away slowly to watch the stringy fluid stretch between them. Rey thinks she shouldn’t be as enticed as she is, to be so coated in him, but she peers down at her hand in a daze, pressing her fingers together only to spread them right after to watch the sticky mess he left behind. 

“If I stay,” Ben murmurs huskily. “I’m going to _stay,_ Omega.” His fingertips graze over her thigh, making her shiver. “If I stay... I’m going to fuck you every way I can think of.” He squeezes her skin, his grip tight. “And I’m going to knot you until I can’t anymore.”

Rey’s breath feels trapped in her chest, her inner Omega practically _singing_ because _yes_ —that is what she wants. She wants all that and more, not really having it in her to pretend that she doesn’t. She brings her fingers to her mouth slowly, enjoying the rumble in Ben’s chest, the way his breath catches. She flicks out her tongue to lick him away from her fingertips, lashes fluttering before she presses them deeper into her mouth to suck him away, tasting salt and spice and _Ben_ —welcoming the fire it stokes inside her now. 

“I know,” she tells him quietly. 

At this point, she’s counting on it. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _*gasps*_ he's going to fucking _stay_ ya'll
> 
> (I’m sorry for being such an insufferable cockblock I promise it’s wall to wall porn until the end now 😂)


	5. oh, when i come to climb

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HELLO (I’m not sure why I open every chapter with hello now that I’m thinking about it 🤷🏻)  
> I am over the flu and back to my healthy, porny self, and so here is so good ole fashioned heat porn to celebrate. Also yes I upped the chapter count again I got carried away with the porn don’t judge me.  
> I have another GORGEOUS sweater board from  
> [colourisgreen](https://twitter.com/colourisgreen):  
>   
> And more MIND-BOGGLING FANTASTIC art from  
> [theriseofswolo](https://twitter.com/theriseofswolo):  
>   
>   
> (Guys idk what to say except I love her so much I mean how perfect is she can we start a fan club dibs on president)

She thinks maybe he’ll take her right there on the rug, but Ben seems to have other plans. 

One moment her thighs are draped on either side of his hips, and in another she’s lifted up into his arms in one fell swoop and carried across the room to his bed to lay her out over his sheets and the pile of his shirts he left. She can scent him there still, her body stirring up his tantalizing aroma as it hits the mattress—and yet it is _nothing_ compared to the warm spice of the real thing.

She immediately buries her nose in his throat, trying to take in even more, and his big body shudders when her fingers tease the swelling glands there. They pulse under her fingertips, and she wants to press her tongue there, wants to _taste_ him—but again, Ben has other plans. 

His palms are wide and _heavy_ when they slide up her ribs, applying pressure as if he’s mapping the shape of her. She feels the weight of them as they ascend higher, over her ribs and under her arms and across her chest—moving in a slow caress until they’re molding around her jaw to turn up her face. She holds her breath as his thumb moves across her lower lip, pressing there to ease her mouth open. She’s having a hard time keeping still, the heat in her belly giving way to a cramping sensation that leaves her squirming, but Ben has more patience than she does. 

“Do you want to know what you smell like?” Her breath catches when the tip of his thumb dips into her mouth, her lips closing around it instinctively. “I could smell you, you know,” he tells her roughly. “Out there in the snow.”

There’s a rush of air that tumbles past her lips, her voice coming out airy on the tail end. “You could?”

“Mhm.” His knees spread between her legs to push apart her thighs, and she can feel the brush of slightly cooler air against her cunt. “It’s like”—he ducks his head to let his nose skirt along her jaw—“cinnamon _.”_ She hears his deep inhale, feels the warmth of his breath wash against her throat as he expels it. “But also something… bright. Like citrus. And underneath—” She gasps when his tongue presses warm and wet against her gland, sliding across the throbbing flesh as a low groan escapes him. “ _—honey_.”

One of his hands has left her jaw to wander, fingers skirting over the front of his shirt she wears. He curls them to fist the soft fabric over her belly, pulling the hem up from her thighs until she’s bare from the waist down.

“Seeing you in my clothes,” he murmurs, inching his shirt higher and _higher._ “In my space, my _bed_ —fucking torture.”

Her eyes drift closed as the rough pads of his fingers graze the inside of her thigh. “It was?”

“Never met anyone who smells as good as you do,” he growls. “The way you smell…” She’s holding her breath now, unable to _breathe_ for the way his fingers tease _so close_ to where she wants him, where she needs _something._ She feels him trace near her cunt, applying pressure in a slow slide, up one side and down the other but _still_ not where she _needs him._ “ _So sweet.”_ She whimpers when he finally, _finally_ teases through her folds, dragging up and down through the mess of her slick before he surprises her by slipping his finger deep inside. “It made me wonder if you _tasted_ as good as you smelled.”

Her mouth parts, and her eyes go wide when he pulls his finger out from inside her—but Ben’s eyes never leave hers. He purposely holds her gaze as he brings it up between them, watching her face as he presses it deep inside his mouth to clean it of her slick. He hums contently, almost like a purr in his chest—and Rey can only watch as he slowly slips his finger out of his mouth, rolling his lips together as if to savor her.

“Fucking _sweet,”_ he grinds out, flicking his eyes down the length of her to settle between her legs. “I’m going to use my mouth later.” He pushes her thighs even further apart with his knees. “But that’s not what you need right now.”

She thinks he’ll take her now, and she _wants it—_ so there’s frustration, when his fingers move to the buttons of his shirt that still swallows her instead. She’s unable to find any relief, unable to press her thighs together with him holding her open like he is—and she makes an impatient sound as he deftly works the buttons apart over her chest. 

“Shh,” he soothes. “Wanna see you.” The sides of his shirt part down to her navel now, revealing the flush that spreads across her chest and lower. “Been thinking about it,” he murmurs, reaching the last few buttons. “About what’s under my shirt.” His hands are shaking a little when he finally has the buttons undone, pulling apart the flannel to open her up like a gift. “You’re so fucking _tiny,”_ he rasps. “Can you take my knot?”

He growls low in his throat when she brings her hand up between them dazedly, licking at her palm to clean away the stickiness of his cum that still lingers there, the heady flavor of him making her dizzy. He’s watching as she presses her fingers into her mouth to seek more, his eyes darkening by the second.

“Answer me, Omega,” he urges hoarsely. “Can you?”

Her fingers fall from her mouth one by one, blinking up at him as she processes the question. “I…” She swallows thickly, shivering with the weight of his hands on the fevered skin between her breasts. “I’ve never been with an Alpha.”

His nostrils flare. “Never?” She gives a slow shake of her head, and Ben’s face turns down slowly, his fingers trailing down the length of her body in a slow slide—over her navel and her abdomen and lower still until his wide palm cups the entirety of her mound. “You mean no one has ever knotted this pretty little cunt?”

Her mouth parts in a quiet gasp, the slight pressure offering a sliver of relief even though it’s _not enough_. “ _Alpha.”_

He’s reaching for the buttons of his own shirt now with his free hand, undoing them one by one as he slips two of his fingers inside her. “You’re tiny here too,” he huffs, pushing deeper inside as she squirms restlessly. “It’s going to be a tight fit.”

 _Yes,_ her instincts sing. _Fill me. Fill me up._

“I can take it,” she mewls. “ _Please_ , Alpha. I can take it.”

She hardly recognizes her own voice, and at some point she is certain she will be _mortified_ by the way she begs—but her inner Omega is in the driver’s seat now, and she’s only along for the ride.

“I know you can,” he croons, the pieces of his _fucking flannel_ falling aside to reveal hard muscle underneath. She slides her hands over his stomach, her fingers trailing down the little line of hair beneath his navel to tease above his still-swollen cock. Ben shudders as her fingertips trace his slightly-softened knot, his hips thrusting a little as he reaches to tear away his shirt. “You’re going to take everything I give you, Omega.” Her eyes rake over broad shoulders and strong arms, _so much_ of Ben to take in. “ _Everything.”_

Everything sounds nice. Everything sounds _amazing_ —and Rey feels that heat licking low in her belly as Ben reaches for his jeans. She’s staring at his cock that is still _so hard,_ reaching up towards his navel, twitching and leaking at the tip, and her body _knows_ how well he will fill her. It seems to sense it, if the steady stream of her slick is any indication. 

He never moves from between her legs as he kicks out of his jeans, and for a moment she’s distracted by thick thighs dusted in dark hair that matches his goatee. He’s still holding her open, his knees bracing her thighs so she can’t close them, and her fingers claw at his hips in a feeble attempt to pull him closer. 

She’s never felt so out of her element, almost as if she’s become an entirely new person. One whose sole purpose is being knotted by this strong, quiet Alpha who is looking at her like he wants to devour her whole.

“Ben,” she whimpers. “Alpha, _please.”_

“I’ve got you,” he murmurs. “Gonna take care of you.”

Again she feels his hand cupping the slick heat of her cunt, stroking through her folds to make a mess before he slips two deep inside. She gasps at the slight fullness, her lashes fluttering as he scissors them apart. 

“It’s been awhile,” he murmurs, watching as his fingers move inside her. “Since I’ve…” His breath leaves him in a shaky rush. “ _Fuck_ , you’re so _wet._ ”

 _For you,_ something inside preens. _All for Alpha._

He slips his fingers out from her slowly, and her eyes widen at the clinging strings of her slick stretching between them. His fingers are shiny, and he flexes and curls them in a lazy way. His gaze drifts to her dazedly, holding her eyes as he reaches to smear her slick down the length of his cock, his fist wrapping around the base to squeeze before he drags it up with a slow twist that leaves him coated in _her._

She can still feel the sticky wet on his fingers when they wrap around her hip, finally, _finally_ curling his big body to bring him closer. His weight settling over her is heavy and _wonderful_ —and he braces himself on his forearm and his hand as his face nears close enough for her to feel the warmth of his breath. 

She can feel his finger teasing at her lip again, some fascination with it, and she hears the heavy swallow in his throat before the hoarse: “I can’t stop thinking about your mouth.” A languid trailing of his calloused fingertip across her lower lip. “Can’t stop thinking about how soft it looks.” His eyes flick up to hers, two nearly-black pools that reflect all the burning need she feels inside. “All of you looks so fucking _soft.”_

And it might be a surprise any other time, when he leans in suddenly to slant his mouth across hers. Might even leave her addled—but every muscle in her body feels drawn too tight, and his tongue at her mouth is like sinking into a warm bath, heavy and hot and _soothing_ in a way that shouldn’t be so because she still needs so much _more_ than this.

He licks into her mouth with a ferocity that doesn’t match his quiet demeanor, but Rey can’t find it in her to complain. She can feel his cock against her thigh (thick, warm, _throbbing)_ , and she shifts incessantly in some quiet urging that he _take_ her. That he give her _exactly_ what she needs.

The scruff at his chin and over his lip tickle her face, but it’s as pleasant as it is foreign, his kiss somehow everything that he is and completely unexpected. Even in this, Ben feels like he’s too big, too _much—_ but Rey is finding she sort of likes that about him. Probably. The hormones make it hard to think rationally.

And the kisses are nice, _heavenly,_ really—but there are still needy cramps deep in her abdomen, and her cunt still clamps down around nothing, and her skin _burns_ —and she is simply not at liberty to indulge in this languid pace that Ben seems perfectly content with.

She makes a sound in her throat, something like a choked whine, and it’s almost easy to wind her hand between them in search of her clit. She just needs a little bit, just a little bit of _something_ to take the edge off, just a _little bit_ , and she’ll—

She whimpers when a strong hand clamps around her wrist, stilling her efforts as he pulls away from her mouth. His breath is ragged and his eyes are wild, his nostrils flaring a little as he grips her wrist tight to pull it up from between them. She draws in a shaky breath when he finds its twin to hold them both in his hand, slowly dragging them up and up and _up_ until they’re clasped high over her head, pressed into his sheets.

He leans up to take her in like this, pinned beneath him at his mercy, his shirt still spread open down her middle and cushioning around her like a flannel bed of his scent. His mouth is parted, his lip poking out to wet the corner before he finds her gaze to hold it.

“ _I’m_ going to be the one making you come, Omega,” he grates out roughly. “Only me.”

“ _Alpha.”_ She tilts her hips uselessly, feeling his cock hot between her folds. “Ben, I—”

“I know,” he soothes, not releasing her wrists. “I know.” He leans in to press his mouth at the corner of hers, murmuring, “I need you to tell me if I need a condom.”

She blinks, brow furrowing as if he’s said something foreign. “...condom?”

“Mhm.” He rolls his hips to thrust through her folds, and she bites her lip hard enough to draw blood as she arches her neck. “Do I?”

“I…” There is still some thread of her sanity that nudges that maybe she should say yes, that reminds her she _barely_ knows him—but it’s lost to the drumbeat of _knot me knot me knot me._ “No,” she chokes out. “Shot.”

His answering hum is almost predatory, like a cat who’s cornered its prey. Rey has never quite wanted to be caught so much. “Do you know what that means?” 

The hand that doesn’t clasp her wrists slides over her thigh, curling his fingers around the soft expanse to hold her open for him. She can feel the thick nudge of his cockhead between her legs, her breath catching, the stretch of _just this_ enough to trap the air in her lungs. 

It’s difficult, shaking her head because: _no no she doesn’t know but how she_ wants _to._

She feels his tongue tease the gland just below her ear, his cock sliding inside in a slow stretch that makes her eyes roll back. “It means you’re going to _feel_ it,” he rasps. “When I fill you up. You’re going to feel every _bit_ of my cum inside you.”

And she’s not sure this should make her shiver like it does, and maybe it is simply she can’t think beyond how _full_ she is—but there’s something in her brain that’s purring, practically _begging_ for every bit of what he’s describing. 

She makes a desperate sound when she feels her body give way to the thicker skin of his knot, hearing the _squelch_ of her slick as it eases him inside. And she’s so full, _too full_ —but it’s so _good_ , it’s _everything,_ and she only wants—

_“More.”_

She tugs at her wrists that are still held captive by his hand, arching her body in a vain attempt to take him deeper. Ben’s teeth nip at the swollen flesh of her gland, forcing a shiver down her spine as she quiets, some unspoken instinct to still overtaking her, some unknown urge to _obey_ seizing her.

“Good girl,” he murmurs, soothing the heated flesh at her throat with his tongue. “It feels better. Doesn’t it. Being full.”

She manages a shaky nod. “Better.”

“Tell me how you got through,” he murmurs into her skin. “Before me.”

He’s moving now, a tortuous drag of his cock against her inner walls, forcing her mouth to part in a wordless cry. “I—I just—toys—”

“And did they feel like this?” His grip at her thigh tightens as his cockhead lingers at her entrance, dipping back inside at that same slow pace. “Did they fill you up like I do?”

She might laugh, if she weren’t so dizzy with hormones and heat and hunky Alpha—because there is _nothing,_ she thinks. Nothing that feels like this. She thinks she tells him so, brokenly, if the low growl in his chest is any indication.

“I wanted to fuck you”—his withdrawal is faster now, his dip back inside rougher—“when I first saw you.” His breath huffs against her throat, his hand shaking where it still pins her wrists against the mattress. “I’ve wanted to fuck you _every moment_ since.” 

This is news to her, _wonderful_ news, the somersaulting sensation in her chest evidence of that—and she turns her face to nudge her cheek to his temple, moving until she can press her lips there after. Her tongue flicks out to taste the sweat there, and how he _shudders_ with it. 

She’d thought him quiet, when she first met him, and maybe he still is—but not like this. Right now it seems like Ben has _more_ than enough to say—his filthy words and dirty promises ringing in her ears, and she finds herself _relishing_ in each one.

“Fucking torture,” he growls. “Seeing your little body in my bed, the way you fucking _smelled.”_ Her body jolts with the way he slams inside her now, her tits bouncing so that her nipples brush his chest in a way that sends shooting tingles across her skin. “And then after. When you were in here, smelling like you did. _So close._ When I thought about you _in here_ —fucking your little fingers, trying to give yourself what only _I could_ —” He makes a nearly inhuman sound, his nails biting into the delicate skin of her wrists and her thighs and everywhere they touch. “I can’t remember wanting _anything_ like the way I wanted you.”

_Yes yes Alpha wants us Alpha will take care of us yes please_

She can feel her heart in her head and her throat and beneath every inch of her skin it seems—pounding a steady rhythm that she can hear rushing in her ears as he fills her again and again and _again._ And she wonders how she got by before this, she wonders how she’ll ever get by _again_ without it—the thick weight of his cock lovely and warm and _perfect_ as it stretches her _just_ to the point of being too much. 

“You feel that?” It’s harder now, pushing back inside her, she can feel the resistance now, the way he _swells._ “Feel the way I’m going to knot you?”

She thinks she’s nodding, she can’t be sure, pulling at her wrists with a need to _touch him_ . “ _Alpha.”_

“And I’m the only one,” he grinds out, his voice taking on some lower pitch that sounds animalistic in her ears. “The _only_ one who knows what this little cunt feels like around my knot. _Fuck,_ Rey.”

Maybe it’s the way he’s fucking her without pretense now, maybe it is simply that he is getting a little lost as well—but his grip on her wrists loosens, and his hands find her waist to hold her tight, and she’s touching his chest and his shoulders and _everywhere else—_ feeling the way she’s getting tighter, the way he’s getting _bigger_.

“I can feel it,” he tells her hoarsely. “It’s wetter. _Tighter._ Are you gonna come for me? Wanna _feel_ it. It’s _mine_ , Omega.”

And in this moment she might agree that it _is_ , that he has sole ownership to every nerve ending in her body—feeling them winding tighter and tighter, a pressure building that begs for _release._ Her face buries in his throat, and her fingers claw at his shoulders, and the way he _tastes_ —gland hot and throbbing with spice and _Ben_ against her tongue—and she wants to sink into it, wants to _drown_ in it, she wants to—

“Fuck. _Fuck.”_

She’s not even sure who says it, doesn’t think it really _matters._ She only registers the way her cunt contracts and squeezes around him, the way his knot swells and _swells—_ until there’s no room left, until she’s absolutely _full of him._ Her eyes shut tight and her mouth parts, and the fever inside gives way to a satisfied kind of warmth that leaves her sated and _whole_ in a way she isn’t used to. The all-over _bliss_ of giving her body what it’s been unconsciously craving. 

She licks lightly at his gland thoughtlessly, enjoying the way his muscles twitch under her fingertips as a gush of warmth blooms inside, because she _feels it_ —just like he said she would. She feels every twitch, every swell, every wet rush as it fills and _fills_. 

Even as she’s breathless after—there’s a strange sense of fulfillment, as if she’s satisfied some divine providence of her biology that she’s denied thus far. The dizzied fog of her heat dies down to a manageable simmer, and for a brief moment there is a flicker of doubt inside, because the way she let him _have_ her, the way she wants to do it _again._

But Ben, it seems, is not allowing space for those seeds to take root. 

He rolls to his side to pull her against his chest, his arm curled under her waist so that his fingers can splay wide over the soft flannel at the base of her spine. She can feel his nose tracing back and forth across her hair, her legs tangled with his and her pelvis flush with his as his knot nestles snugly between her thighs to keep them impossibly close.

She’s boneless and spent and downright exhausted, feeling as if she’s run a marathon rather than sex-climbed an Alpha tree. It’s a blessed escape of the after, she thinks, this drooping of her eyes that foreshadows sleep; it means she can forgo the questions of _what now_ and all that comes with it.

She trembles when his fingers trace up her spine, feeling the way the worn fabric clings to her sweat-drenched skin. 

“I like this on you,” he murmurs, and there’s fluttering in her chest that makes her shift. She doesn’t know what to say, or how to act, searching her fatigued brain for _something_ —but Ben saves her. “Sleep,” he urges quietly, and just as she prickles with being told what to do, because how very _Alpha_ of him: “Gonna fuck you again when you wake up.”

Rey shivers right down to the curl of her toes, thinking that she’ll let it slide.

Just this once.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rey is knot as opposed to an Alpha’s help as she was before, love that for her 🥰


	6. show me the mountain so far behind

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HELLO here is that wall to wall porn I promised  
>   
> Another amazing gif board by [colourisgreen](https://twitter.com/colourisgreen) on Twitter! 😍

There’s something to be said for sharing a heat with an Alpha. 

Normally, Rey wakes to a dry throat and flushed skin and that overwhelming _emptiness_ that her toys can’t _quite_ quell. 

And it’s still there when she wakes now, to be fair—but there’s also a little, well, _more._

It’s a tickle of crisp hair against her thighs, a heavy stroke of _warm_ and _wet_ between them that makes her stomach clench. And it probably shouldn’t be so arousing, and maybe it’s even her hormones that make it so, although she doubts it—but waking up to broad shoulders and dark hair buried between her thighs is _definitely_ a vast improvement to any of her heat experiences thus far. 

It’s not something she indulges in often (although arguably this could be her lack of engagement in all things sex in recent years, to be fair), not even something she particularly _craves_ , someones tongue licking at her cunt messily—but she is learning to put all of her sexual experiences leading up to this in a mental boxed mark _pre-Ben Solo._

Because _Ben’s_ tongue is not messy. Ben’s tongue is practiced, _determined_ —touching her in all the right places, applying all the right pressure, taking her to new heights she hadn’t even known about—and she’s been awake for exactly _seven seconds._

Her throat is still dry, and her skin is still flushed—but she is not empty, no, she can’t be, not with the way Ben’s _tongue_ is doing it’s very best to fill her. 

He seems to sense when she’s awake, but Rey thinks this is made less impressive when considering the sharp gasp that escapes her. Her eyes fly open and her lips part, feeling the broad stroke of his tongue lapping up the center of her. Dark eyes look up at her from between her legs, and her breath is trapped somewhere in her throat as she watches him swirl his tongue around the sensitive bud of her clit. 

He turns his head to nip at the soft expanse of her inner thigh, his breath warm against her skin. “I could smell you,” he murmurs. “When I woke up.” He licks at the mark his teeth have left, humming softly. “You smelled like you needed me.”

His tongue finds the wet crease of her again, licking through her folds with purpose to steal her breath. “ _Alpha.”_

“I told you”—he closes his lips around her center to taste—“that I would use my mouth.” A heavy press of his tongue against her clit, and her back bows from the bed as his lips close around it after for a long draw. “The way you _taste.”_

That burning sensation still dwells in her belly and lower, made hotter by the weight of his tongue and the heat of his mouth as he eats at her cunt like a man starved. Her breath is shallow, her heart pounds in her ribs and her head and lower in her cunt where his mouth drives her to distraction—and Rey can’t decide if it’s torture or bliss, the way he laps at her.

She closes her eyes tight as he sucks at the swollen bud of her clit, stoking that fire inside that only seems to burn brighter with his touch. Her cunt clenches vainly, making it all the more obvious how _empty_ she is—and it is as if Ben senses what she needs, as if he anticipates her body’s wants before she has time to voice them.

She feels the press of his fingers at the slick wet of her entrance, easing two inside slowly, _stretching_ her and filling her deep to pet at that place inside that leaves her gasping. There’s pressure from the calloused tips of his fingers against the softness of her inner walls, and it is a heady contrast to the softness of his lips and tongue that tease her clit, a pressure already building inside that threatens to tear her apart at the seams. 

She squirms against his mouth, his name on her lips in a breathy sigh as she mindlessly tilts her hips further into his face, seeking _more_ of what he can give. There are no thoughts in her head save for those of _release_ —bound to the blinding pleasure that’s roiling in her belly and pulsing between her legs. 

He pins her hips to the bed with the heavy weight of his palm, curling his body until his plush lips latch around the sensitive bundle of her clit, sucking deep and _hard_ as she cries out. She can feel it, like a hot pressure that’s bright enough to make her see stars—and she chases after it with abandon, the rough sounds Ben is making the only ones ringing in her ears.

His fingers curl, and his tongue assaults, and she’s so _close_ , and he _senses it—_ only giving her more, only _taking_ more. She can hear herself begging for it, hear herself pleading because _yes please Alpha right there please please yes,_ and it’s right there, it’s _right there_ —just a little more. A little more, and she’ll—

She comes with a gush against his mouth and a shout at hers, her skin seeming to thrum at every nerve ending as her heart beats loud enough to drown out everything else—and it’s like floating, the way she comes down from it. She distantly registers the press of his mouth heavy and wet as it moves over her skin, pressing lazy kisses over her pubic bone and under her navel and higher to graze across her ribs as he climbs up and over her body.

The gray morning light peeks in through the curtains now, and she blinks up at him when his face hovers over hers, rolling her lips together before he lowers to cover them with his own. There’s a satisfied rumble in his chest, almost like a purr, and she feels his hands gentle and light at her hips as he caresses the skin there. 

There’s still somewhat of an urgency in her skin and deeper, a heat that is not _quite_ satiated with what he’s just done to her, and it’s worrisome, how much she finds herself craving this thing she only just discovered. How much she wants his _knot_ again.

And just as she’s becoming accustomed to the idea of needing him like this, it’s almost as if he _senses_ it. “What else did I say I was going to do when you woke up?”

“You said—” She shivers when he nips at her lower lip, soothing it after with his tongue. “You said that you—”

“Tell me,” he urges roughly. “Tell me what I said.”

“That you were going to fuck me again,” she breathes.

She feels that barely-there quirk of his lips against her own just as his cock nestles between her folds, hot and _so hard._ “And I’m not a liar.”

As the thick head catches at her entrance, as he slowly pushes inside to give her an instant reprieve from the burning—Rey thinks to herself again that sharing a heat with an Alpha is very different indeed.

* * *

People don’t talk about the _after_ very much, Rey thinks by the end of the second day.

After his knot swells, after the burn begins to subside—Rey hadn’t been very prepared for any of these things. Because if there is one thing she’s become _very_ acquainted with in the last twenty-four hours, it is this Alpha’s knot. The Alpha himself however… not so much. 

As vocal as he is while he moves inside her and above and _around_ her with his inherent _largeness_ —Ben reverts to his pensive and quiet self in the after. He is content to study and touch and hold to his heart’s content, never really needing any sort of conversation, but it’s a little hard to settle for that as they are now. 

Because one thing she certainly hadn’t been thinking about while he filled her again and again and _again_ is the position they might find themselves in after. She hadn’t thought about the good half hour after his knot swelled where they would be left waiting for it to subside, waiting to inevitably do it _all over again_ —and thus she has found herself here, draped over his thighs to leave her seated in his lap as his back rests against his thick oak headboard. 

His fingers rub little circles into the swell of her hips, his lips moving idly across her collarbone as his cock still twitches slightly inside. She isn’t dizzied so much by her heat in these moments, and it means she can feel every little gush of his cum, every jerk of his cock, every touch; she can feel _everything_ —and she is just coherent enough to be left addled by it. 

She shifts in his lap, gasping a little when this subsequently tugs on his knot that is rooted firmly inside her. Her hands brace on his chest, and he hums softly in his throat as his knot pulses in answer to her subtle movements. He’s traded the faded red flannel she’d slept in for one of dark blue—seeming to _really_ enjoy the look of her half-dressed in his shirts. She assumes, at least. She can’t think of any other reason to keep her arms tucked inside the sleeves only to leave the front gaping open. 

She clears her throat, searching for something to break up the awkward air that only seems to bother her. “So what do you do for fun?”

His tongue dips out to tease at her throat, making her shiver. “Fun?”

“Well, yeah.” She closes her eyes as his hands slide over her hips to palm her ass. “When your life isn’t being uprooted by an accidental heat.”

“I’m not feeling very uprooted,” he murmurs, the shape of his mouth moving against her gland with every word.

_Do not swoon. Do not. It’s just hormones._

She clears her throat. “Surely you don’t just traipse around in the woods bird watching or talking to trees.”

“No,” he chuckles. “Not so much.”

“So?”

His shoulders move in a shrug. “I make furniture,” he says offhandedly, her brain issuing a little _aha, I knew it._ “So I move that around to sell when I have pieces done. When it’s warm I go fishing off Cannon Beach.” His lips rest against her gland in a soft kiss. “Tillamook is only about an hour from here. Sometimes I help out the Forest Center. I’m pretty good friends with the Game Warden.”

“But what about just… here?” She waves a hand around the space of his home. “When you’re holed up in this place?” 

“I read a lot,” he says matter of factly. “What do _you_ do for fun?”

Her brow furrows. “Me?”

“Mhm.”

It’s surprising that she has to think about it. “I mean… I don’t know. I work a lot. When I _do_ have free time I hang out with my friend Hux and his boyfriend Poe… but it’s rare, these days. I’ve just been so busy.”

“You have to make time for yourself too,” he murmurs. “Take time to enjoy the little things.”

She snorts. “Well, I’m taking plenty of time now.” She has to resist the urge to squirm when she feels his cock twitch inside. “So what’s the last movie you saw in a theater, The Big Lebowski?”

He leans back to look up at her will those dark eyes that are hooded now with the satisfaction of someone who’s just come for the dozenth time since yesterday, chuckling softly. “You’re very interested in my day to day.”

“It just feels so… I don’t know.” She shrugs. “I can’t imagine being by myself all the time. Out here in the middle of nowhere.”

His brow furrows as if he’s considering this, his jaw working subtly in thought. “I’ve always done better by myself.”

She isn’t sure what the odd feeling sparking in her chest is, but it prickles inside as she weighs his answer. “Until I came along,” she says, mostly joking and trying to lighten the mood.

She watches his mouth curl ever so slightly, not _quite_ a smile but as close as Ben seems to be capable of—and it sends an entirely _new_ feeling shooting through her chest. One that makes her altogether wary, for reasons she doesn’t quite understand. 

“I don’t mind so much,” he says quietly. 

She chews on the inside of her lip, telling herself that of _course_ he has to say that. It would be pretty rude otherwise, considering that he’s currently buried inside her. “Really.”

“Mhm.” The tips of his fingers trace up her spine, and her cunt clenches in response—a fruitless effort given there is absolutely no room left inside, something she is all too aware of at this moment. “There is a lot more to… hold my attention right now.”

His wide palms smooth over her ribs to slide down them, squeezing the rounded curves of her hips before brushing over her thighs. Her heart rate picks up when his thumbs brush back and forth over the insides, rolling his hips minutely, tugging at his knot as his mouth parts on a soft inhale.

“This for example,” he murmurs, his thumb _just_ dipping between her folds to tap at her clit. “Is very distracting.”

She sucks in a breath to hold it, tensing as he rolls the little button under the calloused pad of his thumb. She feels warmth blooming in her chest—not the frantic burning that comes from her heat, but something else. Something lazy and pleasant. Something _intimate._

“When I touch you here…” He applies more pressure before he flicks his thumb up and down to tease. “You get so _tight_ inside.” The hand that still rests over her thigh curls to hold it tight against his hip, trapping her close as he thumbs the taut bud of her clit. “I wonder how many times you can come for me before my knot goes down?”

She can feel a flush creeping down her neck and lower to spread across her chest, her lashes fluttering as she bites at her lower lip briefly. “How many times I…?”

“Mhm.” He rolls the pad of his thumb in a steady pattern now, and she feels that heady pressure building inside, unable to do anything but sit there and _take it_. “I want to feel you come, Omega.” The timbre of just voice is harsher now, a rasped quality to it that makes her toes curl. Something that is more _Alpha_ than Ben. “Do you think you can come again for me?”

She’s honestly not sure, although the decadent sensation he's eliciting with his thumb seems to allude to the possibility. She squeezes her thighs around his waist, her cunt squeezing his _knot_ in turn—and she can feel it, the way he twitches inside. 

“You’re so pretty when you come,” he tells her roughly, leaning in until the words are vibrating against the swell of her breast, his tongue flicking out to lick at her nipple. “And the way it feels inside…” He thrusts up aimlessly as if only to remind her just how _stretched_ she is—as if she needs the reminder. “This cunt feels like it was _made_ for my knot.”

She can’t help the way she shivers, the way she _gasps_ —a culmination of his thumb rolling against her clit, his tongue laving at her nipple, his palm sliding up her thigh and over her hip to squeeze at her ass. 

Her arm loops around his neck to steady herself, her abdomen clenching as warmth pools low in her belly. “ _Ah.”_

“Feels good?” His thumb slides to draw back the hood of her clit, circling just above the little bundle to tease but not quite satisfy. “Tell me, Omega.”

“ _Yes,”_ she breathes, tilting her pelvis as if to speed things along and whimpering when this tugs at his knot. 

She cries out when he grips the soft flesh of her ass _harder—_ his teeth applying a bit of pressure at her nipple to make her shudder _._ “Be still.” His lips trace a lazy path between her breasts to mouth at the soft swell on the other side. “I told you. I’m going to be the one making you come.” She feels his tongue sliding higher, painting a wet trail over her collarbone to find the pulsing gland at the curve in her shoulder. “Only me.”

She closes her eyes as his lips move against the largest of her glands, her breath caught in her throat as his tongue presses heavy and wet against it. She’s never given much thought to it before this; she tells herself it’s most likely some ancient instinct that flashes in her vision ( _his teeth breaking the skin, his scent pouring in to meld with hers, his knot swelling inside as he takes and takes and takes),_ and she’s trembling by the time his lips press a soft kiss at her gland before moving higher to tease at her throat. 

His thumb pulls away only to be replaced by the rough pads of his fingers, rubbing a steady circle into her clit that leaves her squirming. She can feel the way his knot throbs just inside, pulsing in time with the contractions of her cunt that spark with every rotation of his fingers. 

“Are you gonna come for me?” He holds her close with his wide palm curved tight against her ass, a rumble in his chest that rolls all over her. “I can feel it, you know? When you’re close.” His breath is warm against her neck as his lips graze higher, kissing just under her jaw. “Especially now,” he huffs. “With your pretty little cunt stretched around my knot.” 

“ _Alpha.”_

“Come on, Omega,” he urges huskily before suckling at the gland below her ear. “Wanna feel you come. Such a sweet Omega. So lovely and good and _sweet.”_ She’s practically shaking, his praise touching something inside she’s never used before; she isn’t thinking about how she doesn’t need it, about how she’s never needed it before—she’s only thinking about the bone-deep pleasure that comes from _Alpha is pleased._ “ _Fuck._ So tight. So _wet._ You feel that?” He presses a little harder against her clit; he rolls over it just a little _faster._ “Feel how close you are? You’re gonna come all over me. You’re going to fucking _come.”_

“Right— _right there_ — _Alpha_ —Alpha, _please_ —”

His mouth is slack against her throat, his breath hot. “Give it to me. You fucking _come.”_

She’s so full of him that it is _useless_ when she constricts around him, when she comes hard enough to feel it in _every_ inch of her body. His knot seems to swell impossibly further, or maybe it is just her getting tighter, she can’t be sure—she only knows that there is absolutely _no room left._ He growls low in his throat as he holds her close, his tongue almost messy against her gland as he works her through it. 

She’s breathless after, heart hammering in her chest, nowhere to go but slumped against his large body as his hand strokes her lower back soothingly. She can’t form coherent thought, still struggling just to catch her breath, but she can _feel_ Ben’s lips curling at her throat. 

“That’s one,” he murmurs.

Rey thinks he might be the death of her.

She isn’t sure she even minds. 

* * *

She is hyper aware of the slick heat of his chest as it presses against her back. 

She idly realizes it’s the first time he’s fucked her without his shirt draped around her, and it feels somehow… more _visceral_ —skin to skin like this. Nothing between them but her slick and their sweat and the warmth of his breath as it huffs against the back of her neck. 

She props up on her forearms, her back arched and her ass high as his big body curls over hers—and she can distantly hear the way she begs for it, the thick slide of his cock as he drives into her again and _again._ The slap of his thighs against the backs of hers is sharp, the weight of his balls heavy as they thud against the slick wet of her cunt. 

She feels his palm hot and wide against her belly, feels him pushing lower until his fingers tease at the already-swollen bundle of her clit—a low moan tearing out of her as his cock buries deep only to draw out and push back inside all over again.

“Gonna knot you,” he growls. “Gonna knot this little cunt. Is that what you want? _Tell me.”_

“ _Yes._ I want it— _please, Alpha.”_

“Hungry little Omega cunt,” he grinds out, his voice hoarse and thick and hardly even like the one she’s used to. “You need it, don’t you. Need your Alpha’s knot. Tell me you need it.”

“I do,” she chokes out, dizzy with the sensation of being so _full._ “ _I need it.”_

“Such a good girl. Such a _good girl_ for your Alpha. So _good_ for me.” 

His praise licks up her spine and deep down in her belly, pooling in her cunt as that promise of relief hovers close. There’s pressure, _overwhelming_ pressure—and she welcomes it, _begs for it—_ drowning in his warmth and his weight and his _voice_ at it rasps her name, tells her how good she is, how _lovely._

And Rey feels it, has never felt quite as _right_ as she does in this moment, with his cock deep inside and his body covering every part of her. Her mouth falls open, her eyes roll back, and there’s a shout on her tongue—some garbled mix of _Ben_ and _Alpha_ and _yes yes yes._

His knot begins to swell even as she continues to tremble and shake, her head spinning as a rush of endorphins course through her to make her feel airy and light. He licks at her mating gland, the one that makes her toes curl, and there’s the briefest flicker of _bite me_ that drifts through her thoughts before good sense claims her. She turns her head to meet his mouth in a sloppy kiss instead, briefly wondering how it’s possible that she can become almost a different person entirely at the peak of these moments. 

Ben pulls her back against his chest as he settles on his side, combing the hair away from her temple and her cheek and her neck as his lips brush just under her ear. She stares at the wood of the opposite wall, breathing still erratic as _such a good girl for your Alpha_ bounces around in her head. 

_Your Alpha._

Something she doesn’t have. Something she’s never entertained. Something she’s never even _wanted_. 

She tells herself that for as dizzied as she feels when they come together like this… surely Ben feels some touch of that also. That’s all it is. 

_Just hormones._

She clears her throat as his arm curls around her, fingertips tracing a lazy pattern below her navel. “You’d think I’d be… more _sore_. After two days of this.”

“Hm.” A soft kiss at her shoulder. “You get so wet, after all.”

She presses her lips together, finding it strange that she still has the ability to get _embarrassed_ after everything they’ve done together. “Yeah. Guess that makes sense.”

“How long do they normally last?”

“Ah… three or four days,” she tosses back. “At most.”

A quiet hum against her skin as thick fingers splay across her belly. “Too soon.”

_Don’t you dare. Of course he would say that. He’s getting to fuck you every which way from Sunday._

She tells herself _again_ for what feels like the _hundredth_ time that it is only her fucking hormones that are against her. That it’s her _heat_ making her feel so oddly sentimental. 

“It must have been hard,” he goes on. “Going through them alone.”

She hadn’t really given thought to the _accuracy_ of his statement until the last couple of days. Until, well… _him._ “Yeah,” she tells him quietly. “I guess so.”

“Why did you?”

“Why did I what? Go without an Alpha?”

“Mhm.”

“I don’t know…” She’s distracted by the way his hand slides over her ribs to climb higher, covering the entirety of her breast to palm her there lightly. “I guess… I’m used to fending for myself. I didn’t think I needed anyone.”

A soft chuckle at her nape. “I know what you mean.”

_I don’t. Need anyone._

She recalls how odd she’d found his answer when she first met him, but now she’s sort of wondering if they’re really so different. 

Except, they are. Sure, it is only roughly thirty minutes between them from her home to his—but they are _world’s_ apart in everything else. They have absolutely nothing in common. No reason at all to contemplate anything outside of this. Outside of this short span of days where they are bound by threadbare circumstance.

Right?

“Let’s hope you don’t take to the woods,” he teases softly, drawing her out of her own head. 

She chews on the inside of her lip for a good number of moments, nestling a little closer as her heart thumps with an odd rhythm. Her voice is barely a whisper when she answers: “The woods aren’t _so_ bad. I guess.”

His answer comes in a tightening of his arm around her, in a soft touch of his lips to her throat. She closes her eyes as the warmth of his breath washes against the shell of her ear, his body curling until he’s touching every part of her he can reach. 

“Sleep,” he mutters.

Her lips quirk at the corners. “Gonna fuck me again when I wake up?”

“Yeah,” he breathes. “Yeah, I am.”

_Three or four days. At most._

For the very first time since she presented… Rey finds herself reluctant to see her heat end. 

_Just hormones,_ she reminds herself. _That’s all._

Right?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> did this get... soft


	7. you keep me coming round

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HI FIRST OFF  
> I FORGOT TO ADD THESE TO THE LAST CHAPTER! BUT! AREN’T THEY INCREDIBLE? I ASK MYSELF HOW IM SO HORNY FOR HANDS BUT I SO AM. 🥵  
>   
>   
> Amazing art by the wonderful [ HouseOfFinches ](https://twitter.com/HouseOfFinches) on Twitter! 😍  
>   
> Another amazingboard by [colourisgreen](https://twitter.com/colourisgreen) on Twitter! 😍

She can sense it, when her heat begins to wane—and she thinks she is not the only one.

Ben’s touch becomes less frantic, his words less filthy, and by the third day—it seems he is content to hold her beneath him, rocking into her at a pace that might have frustrated her only hours ago.

She welcomes it now—the way his hands cup her face, the way his lips move over hers in a way that is almost tender, the way his cock dips inside in a slow rhythm that is as torturous as it is lovely—she wonders if he is as reluctant for this to end as she is. She wonders if it is only her that finds herself regretful at the idea of walking away. 

But like a coward she says nothing, simply clinging to him a little tighter, holding his body close as he fills her in a way that is almost reverent. He still tells her how good she is, how _lovely_ —but it’s softer now. Whispered into her skin and sealed with his kiss that nearly sears her skin with the heat of it. 

And after, when his knot swells and his breath huffs against her throat, when his tongue presses to her gland with something she can pretend is longing—she doesn’t feel the same urges she’s felt to fill the silence with conversation. She finds herself content to nestle against him, memorizing the heat and shape of his body as she contemplates the possibility of asking to see him again. 

She still thinks it’s crazy, it’s still fairly certain that there’s absolutely no way it would work, considering how different they are—but it doesn’t stop her from wondering. She’s never wanted another person before, not like this, and the fear of rejection is palpable. It makes her all too aware of why she’s never fooled with it in the past. She’s not sure she’s enthused about these new and terrifying desires she’s feeling.

But she thinks there’s still time to weigh her options. The sun sinks low outside of his window, having shone for the first time in days today, even if they both had been mostly oblivious to it. There were other things to be worrying about inside his cabin. 

Ben’s arm is warm and heavy as it drapes around her middle, his knot much the same as it throbs softly inside. By morning she knows she will be back to normal, and beyond that… she just isn’t sure.

She closes her eyes as his fingers idly trace the curve of her breast, telling herself that these are worries for tomorrow. 

She tells herself that tonight she can just enjoy him.

For a little while longer, at least.

* * *

She knows things are different when she wakes, largely in part because it is the first time since her heat began that he hasn’t woken her with his kiss or his tongue or his cock. His hands aren’t urgent when they touch her shoulder, more of a gentle shake as he quietly rouses her from sleep. 

She’s in his shirt again, and she can’t help the way she briefly turns her face to press her nose to the soft flannel and breathe him in. She finds him perched at the edge of his bed when her lashes finally flutter open, watching her with an unreadable expression as his finger trails down her arm to linger. 

“The tow truck is here,” he tells her quietly.

For a moment she finds herself confused, because in all they’ve done in this bed she had somehow _forgotten_ why she was stuck here to begin with—and she furrows her brow as she sleepily pushes up on her arm to rub at her eyes.

“Tow truck?”

“Yeah,” his eyes flick down to the gaping pieces of flannel that barely cover her breasts on either side. “I helped him find your car.” His lips press together briefly. “I figured you could use the rest.”

She blinks back at him. “So he’s…”

“Outside,” Ben says evenly. “Waiting on you. I didn’t—” His nostrils flare with an inhale, eyes tracing the shape of her in a way that even without the dizzied haze of her heat makes her press her thighs together. “I didn’t want him in here. With you.”

She swallows thickly, wondering what that means—wondering if it means any of the things she _wants_ it to mean, or if he’s simply still affected by the age old happenstance of an Alpha and an Omega doing what they were born to do.

She looks down at the way she’s dressed, the way she’s hardly even, really, biting at her lip as she assess the sticky situation between her thighs, the tacky feeling of her skin that comes from too much fucking and all the sweat that comes with it. She’s torn between wanting to stay as she is—her instincts already recoiling at the idea of _washing away Alpha’s scent_ —but deep down she knows it’s inevitable. 

Eventually she’ll have to wash all of him away.

“I…” She wrinkles her nose. “Think he’ll wait for me to shower?”

She wonders if he can sense the way she’s stalling, but if he does—he says nothing of it. He nods back at her, still looking at her with an expression she wishes she could decipher. “He’ll wait.”

There’s an unspoken _I’ll make sure of it_ —but she can also sense the tension in his body, feel it in the clench of his fingers that still curve around her elbow, and she can’t help but think that maybe he’s as reluctant for her shower as she is. She fantasizes that he also wants his scent to linger on her body.

She pushes up to her knees to wring her hands in her lap, chewing on the inside of her lip as the soft flannel touches her hands. “I guess I’d better do that then.”

“Right.” He withdraws his hand finally, and part of her instantly mourns the loss. “I’ll leave you to it then.”

She wonders if she imagines the reluctant way he stands from the bed, but she _knows_ she doesn’t imagine the way he looks back at her from the doorway, his eyes flicking down the length of her briefly before he disappears outside.

Rey releases a breath she’s been holding, her eyes sweeping around this tiny cabin that she’d been half repulsed by only days ago—now wondering if she really wants to leave it.

Wondering how in the hell she’ll be able to.

* * *

Ben is still missing from the cabin by the time she leaves his bathroom, and she isn’t sure if she’s grateful or put out by it. She wishes she could get a better read on him, wishes there was some clear sign to let her know that she isn’t alone in the way she feels—still wondering if it’s prudent to feel that way in the first place.

It’s just that they’re so _different._

She can hardly think of a single thing about their lives that share a common thread—and there is still some nagging part of her that tells her this is the answer she’s looking for. It’s just that there is still some part of her—a much _louder_ part that she’s never used before him—that vehemently protests against the idea of walking away from him without looking back. It argues against every sensible thought in her head, making her steps heavy, her movements slow—prolonging the moments that will inevitably lead to her leaving. 

It isn’t as if Ben _asked_ her to stay, she tells herself as she shimmies into her jeans. It isn’t as if he has given her _any_ indication that he wants to see her again—and doesn’t that mean something? Aren’t all Alphas the _take whatever I want_ types? It’s certainly seemed to suit every Alpha she’s met prior.

 _But Ben is different_ , that same voice whispers. 

_He would still mention it,_ her good sense argues back. _If he wanted you._

And that’s the crux of it, she thinks. The idea that _Alpha_ doesn’t want her. Three days ago, it never would have bothered her. Three days ago, she wouldn’t have even _wanted_ it to begin with. 

But Rey thinks she might not be the same Rey that she was three days ago.

She just doesn’t know if she can say the same for Ben.

She finds him on the front porch when she’s dressed, leaning against one of the thick wood posts that hold up the tin overhang above them. She’s struck by his overall _largeness_ all over again, finding it just as unsettling even after she’s experienced it so intimately. 

The tow truck rumbles in Ben’s front yard, her car hitched to the back and an older man giving a little wave out of the window of the driver’s side to signal he’s ready for her. Ben is quiet as he watches her close his front door, his hands firmly in the pockets of his thick Carhartt jacket. 

She tucks a strand of hair behind her ear in a nervous gesture, clearing her throat as she looks down at the way she’s dressed. “I hope you don’t mind that I borrowed one of your shirts.” She toys with one of the buttons idly. “Mine somehow got ripped.”

It’s a lie, a feeble one, but she can’t seem to _actually_ bring herself to tell him she just wanted something of his to take with her. Even in her head it sounds pathetic.

His eyes dip down to the red flannel, almost seeming to darken, unless she’s imagining that too. “It’s fine,” he answers in that low voice that she feels deep down in her belly. “It suits you.”

“Practically made for the woods,” she titters, shuffling her feet.

“Yeah.”

His lips roll together in a way that makes her think briefly that he might say more, but in the end there is only a slight twitch in his jaw, one that seems as if he’s grinding his teeth together. Rey turns her head to peer out at the tow truck, her fingers twisting at the hem of Ben’s shirt and feeling like her skin is too tight, like it’s reaching out in search of him already, knowing that in minutes he’ll be in rearview. 

_Hormones,_ she tells herself feebly. _That’s all._

It sounds weak even to her, even in her thoughts.

“Well…” She gives a little shrug, not really knowing what else to do in a situation like this. One where you scale an Alpha tree legs first and find yourself wanting to keep shaking his branches after. “I guess I…” _God, why is this so hard?_ “Thank you?” _Terrible, terrible thing to say. What the fuck, Rey._ “For everything,” she tries to correct, somehow making it worse. “You know.”

_Did you just thank him for fucking you senseless?_

“Right.” His shoulders roll as if his jacket doesn’t fit right. “Of course.”

“I mean, if you’re ever in Astoria—” She laughs nervously, looking down at her feet. “But I guess you don’t come to town often.”

“I don’t,” he answers quietly. 

“Right. Yeah.” She’s drawing it out, and she thinks it’s obvious at this point. “Well, I guess I’ll… see you around?”

She looks up to meet dark eyes that _still_ tell her nothing. “Maybe.”

There are seconds that pass between them, several, it feels like, ones where she thinks maybe she’ll say something, ones where she thinks maybe _he will_ —but it seems there is nothing more to be said. Maybe that’s the answer she’s been looking for. 

Rey takes a deep breath, reminding herself that it isn’t the end of the world. 

Even if it sort of feels like it, in a fleeting, dramatic sort of way. 

“Bye, Ben,” she offers lamely. 

He nods stiffly. “Goodbye, Rey.”

She turns away even though it’s hard, refusing to look back even though every muscle in her body seems to revolt at this decision. She takes the steps down from the porch, careful to stay on the shoveled path she isn’t even sure when Ben found the time to work. She gives a polite greeting to the man in the driver’s seat of the truck as she climbs in, trying not to wrinkle her nose as her senses are assaulted with something that is inherently _Alpha_ —one that is almost _acrid_ when she compares it to the warm, pleasant aroma that still clings to the shirt she wears. She finds herself tucking her chin to her chest as soon as she closes the truck door just to chase the other Alpha’s scent away. 

“Sorry it took so long for me to get out here,” he tosses across the truck cab as he shifts it in drive. “Hell of a storm, wasn’t it?”

Rey tells herself not to look, but it’s a futile effort, she thinks. Proven by the way her eyes drift over to the side mirror to take in the big, brooding Alpha still standing resolute on his porch, watching the truck start to move. “Yeah,” she answers absently. “Hell of a storm.”

She could almost laugh, because that’s exactly what Ben Solo has felt like. A _storm._ Blowing through her functional life and making a mess of things. She can’t put her finger on the emotion in her chest, can’t _quite_ pin it down—but it’s so reminiscent of _regret._ Something that seems ridiculous, given that she hasn’t actually _left_ yet. Her eyes linger on the reflection in the little side mirror, laughing a little under her breath at the tiny printed line of _objects in mirror may be closer than they appear._

Such an absurd message from the universe, and yet it almost steals her breath all the same. 

Because he _does_ feel closer than he appears. Sure, he is quiet, and impossibly large, and has absolutely nothing in common with her—but she recognizes that it feels so wrong to walk away because it most likely _is._ Because it’s the thought in her head that feels the loudest, shouting above all those that naysay. 

She doesn’t _want_ to leave. At least not like this. Not without knowing she can see him again.

“Stop,” she breathes hastily, and then a little more forcefully: “ _Stop.”_

The truck lurches as the driver slams on the breaks, whipping his head around to look at her like she’s crazy. Maybe she is.

A laugh burbles out of her as she quickly opens the truck door, ignoring his shouts of confusion as she slams it behind her after jumping into the snow. She nearly takes a tumble in the white mess that is beyond the path—quickly righting herself to take in Ben’s confused expression as she starts to trudge through the snow that comes to her knees at a pace that is far faster than it calls for. 

She’s nearly out of breath with the effort when she finally stumbles back onto the shoveled path, half-sprinting up the steps to his porch as her chest rises and falls with effort. 

“Rey?” Ben is looking at her like she’s a little crazy too, but she doesn’t really _feel_ crazy. “Did you forget something?”

She straightens, still trying to catch her breath a little as she blurts out: “You could come to town more often.”

“I…” His brow furrows for a moment as he tries to make sense of this, but she sees the moment it clicks for him, his jaw working subtly. “I could.”

“And I could come visit.”

There’s a twitch at his mouth, one that warns of a very _Ben Solo_ smile. “You could.”

“It’s not _so_ bad out here. After all.”

A curling at the corners of his mouth that seems more than anything he’s given her so far. “Right.”

“But you’re going to have to get a phone.” His mouth turns down now, already looking as if he’s ready to protest, but Rey holds out a finger in warning. “A flip phone. With one number.”

His features relax, his expression turning warmer. “One number?”

“Yes.” She nods determinedly. “Mine.”

She can’t describe what a _full blown smile_ from Ben Solo does to her—but she’s suddenly very grateful it doesn’t come out often. She’d never get anything done.

“I could live with that,” he says quietly.

She breathes out a sigh of relief. “I didn’t think—didn’t think you wanted—”

“Neither did I,” he tells her honestly. “I didn’t… think you’d want anything. Outside of… well. You know.”

“I mean…” She bites her lip to hide her smile. “I _do_ want that too.”

His eyes crinkle at the corners, and the way he steps close… She’s breathing hard for an entirely different reason now. His wide palm slides up her throat to cup her jaw, pulling her in as he holds it. “You know…” His thumb strokes back and forth across her jawline. “You’re already late to your meeting.”

“Very late,” she answers breathily. 

His lips curl. “I have a truck.”

“You do.” 

“I bet one more day couldn’t hurt.”

She already knows she’ll be sending the tow truck along without her, her mouth splitting into a wide grin that he matches, and _fuck_ —that is definitely a dangerous weapon.

She pushes up on her toes, her lips hovering against his as his scent blooms around her—feeding warmth into every part of her despite the chill in the air, and she thinks she could get used to it. His kiss is heavy, _too much_ —just like the rest of him, and she thinks she could get used to that too.

She’s still smiling as she pulls away, murmuring a quiet _make it two_ against his mouth even as his thick arms wrap around her to pull her closer.

Looks like she’s taking to the damn woods.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I KNOW. SOFT, RIGHT?
> 
> Thanks for coming along for this very porny ride! Assume these two eventually got married, Rey completely took to the woods, and had an entire litter of large children clad in flannel. It’s canon. 💕

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!  
> Come say hi on [tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/kylotrashforever)!  
> I made a [Twitter](https://mobile.twitter.com/KTF_Reylo), come follow me!


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